Dear Abe,

You've been at the forefront of American Jewish criticism of President Obama's renewed push for Israeli-Arab peace.   After a recent meeting with the President along with 15 other Jewish leaders, you confessed that you continue "to feel uncomfortable with the assumptions that underlie President Obama's approach" to Israel and the Middle East. 

You've charged that President Obama's outreach to the Muslim world is being conducted "at Israel's expense."   For Obama, you say, "there is a need for the US to demonstrate that it can be tough with Israel to win back credibility with Muslims. We are seeing it already on the settlement issue..." 

But being tough on Netanyahu about settlements is not at "Israel's expense."  It is a blessing to Israel, given the grave threat which many Israeli military and political leaders have said the settlements pose to Israel's security, to the very possibility of a two-state solution to its conflict with the Palestinians, and to Israel's ability to remain a democratic Jewish state.   For the last eight years, we've had a president who recklessly squandered American prestige.   He had no credibility to broker an Israeli-Arab accommodation.   He made little more than token efforts to do so, when not trumpeting his outright opposition to negotiations with Syria, despite the unanimous advice of Israel's intelligence and military brass, and its political leadership.  An American president who has regained the confidence of the Arab and Muslim worlds is quite simply a strategic asset to Israel.   American pressure over settlements is an investment in Israel's future, a gift to the Zionist project.   

Nor does pressure need to be applied simultaneously and in equal doses to satisfy some artificial notion of even-handedness.   As Larry Derfner points out in the Jerusalem Post, "The Palestinian Authority has been cracking down on Hamas for a long while, it kept the West Bank miraculously quiet during Operation Cast Lead, it's enforcing the law in city after city... If the PA wasn't giving us peace and we were giving it land - we'd be right to demand that Obama put all the pressure on the Palestinians and none on us.  But the fact is that Abbas and the PA are giving us about as much peace as they're capable of, while we aren't planning on giving them an inch; instead, we're thinking only about how much more conquered land Obama will let us build on."

You've said that President Obama's "notion that we have to pressure Israel to show our bona fides to the Arabs is to buy into their distorted version of history."   You've accused the president of ignoring the history of Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts.   But such criticisms stand reality on its head.   Obama understands all too well why past peace efforts have failed.  His new way is designed to overcome the errors and missteps of the past.  By adopting a regional approach, he is more likely to gain wide Arab backing for historic Palestinian compromises on Jerusalem and refugees, issues which resonate throughout the Arab and Muslim worlds.   By enlisting the help of Syria, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, he stands a better chance of bringing about a unified Fatah-Hamas Palestinian government that will hew to the international and Arab consensus:  a government that will have both the will and the wherewithal to honor its commitments under a peace accord with Israel. 

Obama recognizes that the US cannot help forge peace between Israelis and Palestinians while allowing Syria and Iran to continue to stoke Hezbollah and Hamas extremism. While Bush added fuel to the fires of Arab and Muslim radicalism, Obama is cutting off their oxygen supply, sapping Hezbollah's political power and reinforcing the impetus towards pragmatism in Hamas.  Obama is finally ending the practice, perfected under Bush, of saying one thing--whether about settlements or the president's commitment to help negotiate an accord--and then doing something else. 

You hold up President Bush's "enunciation of the need for a Palestinian state, the road map, Israel's disengagement from Gaza in 2005, and the Annapolis process in 2007" as having "provided opportunities for progress toward peace if the Palestinians were truly interested."  You highlight what "Israel has done in recent years to advance peace:  Israel's offer of a Palestinian state at Camp David in 2000, its unilateral withdrawal from Lebanon, also in 2000, and its disengagement from Gaza were all steps upon which there could have been building toward peace."  Instead, you conclude, "the Palestinians responded with rejection, suicide bombs and kidnappings, extremist politics and rockets."

But this Manichean narrative of righteous Israelis and evil Palestinians - the stock-in-trade of right-wing hasbarah - is a cartoon version of what went wrong, ignoring true causes and effects.  Annapolis did not fail because the Palestinians refused to accept another "generous Israeli offer," but because President Bush did nothing to help the parties bridge the gaps, failing to apply diplomatic tools to encourage their agreement to a US-proposed compromise, as President Carter successfully did with Egypt and Israel.   Similarly, Bush did nothing to hold either party accountable for their commitments under the Road Map, even after promising to "ride herd" on both as he left the company of Sharon and Abbas at Aqaba. 

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As published in the Jerusalem Report, May 18, 2009

With the maiden visit of newly elected Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Washington set for May 18, signs of an immanent clash between U.S. President Barack Obama and the hardline Israeli leader abound.

While both leaders will look to find common ground, papering over differences with diplomatic formulas, the rift may be unavoidable. The impending tension recalls previous encounters between Likud leaders and U.S. presidents from both parties.  This time the tremors will center not only on the Palestinian fault line, but also on Iran.

Netanyahu views the development of an Iranian uranium enrichment capacity as an existential threat to Israel that must be squelched. He is certain that Obama's "dialogue" with Iran is bound to fail, rendering inevitable an Israeli strike against Iranian nuclear sites. An Israeli attack will be preceded by more punishing economic penalties on Iran of the kind mooted lately on Capitol Hill, and backed by AIPAC, the hawkish pro-Israel lobby. But sanctions-on-steroids are unlikely to blunt Iran's quest to join the nuclear club, serving only to clear away the final hurdles blocking a final push for preemptive Israeli military action.

Obama's way represents nothing less than a revolution in the Middle East: not the stillborn new Middle East the Bush Administration imagined could be midwifed by the force of American and Israeli arms, but a new order that will arise from the centripetal forces unleashed by a political earthquake. How does Obama hope to set in motion this tectonic realignment? Reading the tea leaves, one can divine an unfolding pattern whose contours will only be more fully revealed when Obama delivers a major speech to the Arab and Muslim worlds in Egypt on June 4, following meetings with Netanyahu, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.  

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On Thursday, students from the Basij (people’s militia) handed a bouquet of flowers to the Venezuelan embassy in Tehran. This was in gratitude for the recent expulsion of the Israeli ambassador from Caracas.

Iran’s leadership is furious about what is happening in Gaza. Iran’s population is also angry, but for a different reason.

In Iranian culture, supporting the underdog is a national characteristic. Iranians see themselves as a minority, so they try to relate. As a child, I specifically remember learning about Bobby Sands, an IRA prisoner who died in British prisons because he went on a hunger strike in protest. In Iran, the majority of people sided with the IRA. Not because they hate Britain, but because the Irish were the underdogs. The same feelings were demonstrated during the British invasion of the Falkland Islands in 1982. Every single one of us in our classroom backed the Argentinians. Never mind the fact that the war was caused by Galtieri, the then-Argentine president who was a fascist with an alcohol problem. We simply did not know. There was the strong (Britain) and the weak (Argentina). The choice was easy and obvious.

So when it comes to Gazans, the Iranian people feel bad for Gazans because they see them as underdogs. One has to remember that Iranians lived through eight years of war started by Saddam Hussein, which led to the devastation of their country. Nobody came to help them and they see the same in Gaza. Does this mean that they want to eliminate Israel? The answer in the majority of cases is negative. This is against the wishes of hardliners in the Iranian government who would love to brainwash the people of Iran, especially the young through the use of TV programs, gory pictures of casualties in Gaza, and in some cases outright lies about what is happening there. But so far, apart from hardcore fundamentalists, they are not succeeding. The only thing which the majority of the people of Iran want eliminated is poverty and unemployment in their own country. Not some country 1,000 kilometers away called Israel.

The Iranian government has its own reasons for being angry. First and foremost the Israeli assault is a sign of Israel’s increasing military and diplomatic confidence. Iran’s hope was that after the 2006 war against Hezbollah, which many Iranian politicians saw as an outright victory, Israel would not undertake any more military operations against Iran’s allies, in fear of a massive Hezbollah retaliation.

However, this has not happened. The Israeli air force still flies into Lebanese airspace. And the 2006 war did not stop Jerusalem from bombing the nuclear site in Syria in 2007, as confirmed by foreign press. This is in addition to the assassination of high-profile Hezbollah commander Imad Mughniyeh in broad daylight in Damascus, which Iranians saw as an Israeli act. And now Israel has launched a massive military assault against Iran’s allies in Gaza. So where is the limit? When and where will Israel stop? If successful in Gaza, will the next stop be Iran’s nuclear facilities?

This is one of the reasons why the rocket attacks against Israel took place from Lebanon. Tehran, through Hezbollah’s Palestinian allies, wanted to tell the Israelis not to become too sure of themselves. That there is a limit to Iran’s patience. Despite Israel’s assault in Gaza and damages caused against Hamas’ military infrastructure, Iran wanted to say that Hezbollah still retains the option to act and it will be a costly one for Israel.

Another important factor for the Iranian government is the duration of the current conflict. One of the major worries for Tehran is that George Bush, who has two weeks to go before his presidential term ends, will allow Israel to launch an attack against Iran’s nuclear facilities. The current conflict in Gaza serves Iranian interests because it is keeping Israel busy. Unless there is a major threat facing the leadership of Hamas, it is likely that Iran will want the conflict to continue until Barack Obama enters office on January 20.

Iran’s other hope is that the longer the conflict goes on, the more public support Israel will lose in the EU. There is a danger that this hope would materialize, due to increasing reports that Israel is not cooperating with the United Nations and the International Red Cross. The hardships which the civilian population of Gaza suffers also cause massive damage to Israel’s image and standing in Europe and Asia. Judging by reports and reactions in the international media, including American outlets such as the New York Times, Israel is not doing a good job to address such concerns.

There is also the question of the Israeli government not wanting to talk to Hamas because it does not want to legitimize the organization. This in the long term could backfire, especially if the conflict drags on because its participation could become essential in holding the organization accountable for its future actions. Last but not least, if Israel does not talk to Hamas, its allies such as the United States may. And this would be a major diplomatic victory for the Iranian government and Hamas.

One of the main goals of Israel’s invasion of Gaza is to weaken the hand of Iran. Crushing Hamas’ military infrastructure would bring security in the short to medium term. A long-term solution involves strengthening Palestinian moderates, especially the PLO.

What scares the government of Iran is peace between Israelis and Palestinians, and Israel should try its best to make this dream for the people of the world, and nightmare for the government of Iran, come true.

Ehud Olmert's announcement that he would step down from office caught no one by surprise. The drama surrounding the announcement was typical of Olmert, a Prime Minister who has always been much more style than substance.

Israel treats its politicians harshly, even by the cynical standards of the twenty-first century. Almost all leave office under a cloud of disgrace. Where American presidents, even those who left office in disgrace, are generally respected figures in their later lives, even towering figures like Golda Meir, Moshe Dayan, and David Ben-Gurion, all held in almost idolatrous esteem in the United States, were treated much less ceremoniously in Israel.

On the flipside, disgraced leaders in Israel often have an easier time rehabilitating their image than do leaders in the United States, often even climbing the rungs of party politics to regain positions at the top of government. Such was the case with Ariel Sharon, who rebounded from the debacle of the first Lebanon War in 1982 to regain his position in the Likud Party, eventually becoming its leader and winning the premiership before forming his own party. Ehud Barak suffered the worst defeat of any incumbent Prime Minister ever, yet came back to lead the Labor Party and hold the Defense portfolio. Benjamin Netanyahu left office amid scandal and anger, after being soundly defeated by Barak, yet is currently the leading candidate for Prime Minister in most polls. Both Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres regained the office after earlier tenures that were widely regarded as failures.

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Two weeks ago, I spoke with Barack Obama about the Middle East, Zionism, and his favorite Jewish writers. Since my blog is both fair and balanced, I had a lengthy conversation with Senator John McCain earlier this week about many of the same subjects.

The two candidates, who are scheduled to address the AIPAC policy conference in Washington, D.C. early next week, have well-developed thoughts on the Middle East, and their differences are stark. Obama sees the Israeli-Palestinian dispute as one of America’s central challenges in the Middle East; McCain names Islamic extremism as the most formidable challenge. Obama sees Jewish settlements as "not helpful" to peacemaking between Israel and the Palestinians; McCain does not offer a critique of the settlements, instead identifying Hamas’ rocket attacks on the Israeli town of Sderot as the most pressing problem. And both men take very different positions on the issue of Philip Roth.

In our conversation, McCain took a vociferously hard line on Iran (and a similarly hard line on Senator Obama’s understanding of the challenge posed by Iran). He accused Iran of not only seeking the destruction of Israel, but of sponsoring terrorist groups – Hamas and Hezbollah – that are bent on the destruction of the United States. And he said that the defense of Israel is a central tenet of American foreign policy. When I asked him why he is so concerned about Iranian threats against Israel, he said – in a statement that will surely placate Jewish voters who are particularly concerned about existential threats facing Israel – “The United States of America has committed itself to never allowing another Holocaust.”

Here is an edited transcript of my talk with McCain:

Jeffrey Goldberg: Is the Zionist cause just, and has it succeeded?

John McCain: I think so. I’m a student of history and anybody who is familiar with the history of the Jewish people and with the Zionist idea can’t help but admire those who established the Jewish homeland. I think it’s remarkable that Zionism has been in the middle of wars and great trials and it has held fast to the ideals of democracy and social justice and human rights. I think that the State of Israel remains under significant threat from terrorist organizations as well as the continued advocacy of the Iranians to wipe Israel off the map.

JG: Do you think the Palestinian cause is just?

JM: In respect to people like Mahmoud Abbas, who want to have a peaceful settlement with the government of Israel, to settle their differences in a peaceful and amicable fashion. If you are talking about Hamas or Hezbollah, which are dedicated to the extinction of the state of Israel, then no. It depends on who you’re talking about.

JG: Senator Obama told me that the Arab-Israeli dispute is a “constant sore” that infects our foreign policy. Do you think this is true, and do you think that the Arab-Israeli dispute is central to our challenges in the Middle East?
JM: Well, I certainly would not describe it the way Senator Obama did –

JG: He wasn’t referring to Israel as an “open sore,” he was referring to the conflict.

JM: I don’t think the conflict is a sore. I think it’s a national security challenge. I think it’s important to achieve peace in the Middle East on a broad variety of fronts and I think that if the Israeli-Palestinian issue were decided tomorrow, we would still face the enormous threat of radical Islamic extremism.

I think it’s very vital, don’t get me wrong. That’s why I’ve spent so much time there. The first time I visited Israel was thirty years ago, with Scoop Jackson and other senators, when I was in the Navy. I visited Yad Vashem (Israel’s Holocaust memorial) with Joe Lieberman the last time I was in Israel. So my absolute commitment is to peace between Israel and the Palestinians. But the dangers that we face in the Middle East are incredibly severe, in the form of radical Islamic extremists.

JG: Do you think that Israel is better off today than it was eight years ago?

JM: I think Israel, in many respects, is stronger economically, their political process shows progress – when there is corruption, they punish people who are corrupt. The economy is booming, they have a robust democracy, to say the least. Bin Laden has not limited his hatred and desire to destroy the United States to the Israeli-Palestinian issue, though Israel is one of the objects of his jihadist attitude. What you’re trying to do is get me to criticize the Bush Administration.

JG: No, I'm not, what I'm --

JM: Yeah, you are, but I’ll try to answer your question. Because of the rise of Islamic extremism, because of the failure of human rights and democracy in the Middle East, or whether there are a myriad of challenges we face in the Middle East, all of them severe, all of them pose a threat to the existence to the state of Israel, including and especially the Iranians, who have as a national policy the destruction of the state of Israel, something they’ve been dedicated to since before President Bush came to office.

JG: What do you think motivates Iran?

JM: Hatred. I don’t try to divine people’s motives. I look at their actions and what they say. I don’t pretend to be an expert on the state of their emotions. I do know what their nation’s stated purpose is, I do know they continue in the development of nuclear weapons, and I know that they continue to support terrorists who are bent on the destruction of the state of Israel. You’ll have to ask someone who engages in this psycho stuff to talk about their emotions.

JG: Senator Obama has calibrated his views on unconditional negotiations. Do you see any circumstance in which you could negotiate with Iran, or do you believe that it’s leadership is impervious to rational dialogue?

JM: I’m amused by Senator Obama’s dramatic change since he’s gone from a candidate in the primary to a candidate in the general election. I’ve seen him do that on a number of issues that show his naivete and inexperience on national security issues. I believe that the history of the successful conduct of national security policy is that, one, you don’t sit down face-to-face with people who are behave the way they do, who are state sponsors of terrorism.

Senator Obama likes to refer to President Kennedy going to Vienna. Most historians see that as a serious mistake, which encouraged Khrushchev to build the Berlin Wall and to send missiles to Cuba. Another example is Richard Nixon going to China. I’ve forgotten how many visits Henry Kissinger made to China, and how every single word was dictated beforehand. More importantly, he went to China because China was then a counterweight to a greater threat, the Soviet Union. What is a greater threat in the Middle East than Iran today?

Senator Obama is totally lacking in experience, so therefore he makes judgments such as saying he would sit down with someone like Ahmadinejad without comprehending the impact of such a meeting. I know that his naivete and lack of experience is on display when he talks about sitting down opposite Hugo Chavez or Raul Castro or Ahmadinejad.

JG: There’s no rationale for sitting down with Iran?

JM: Yes. I could see a situation hopefully in the future if the Iranians would change the policies that you and I have just talked about, but there would have to be negotiations and discussions and all kinds of things happening before you lend them the prestige of a face-to-face meeting with the President of the United States of America. As you know, our ambassador in Iraq, Ryan Crocker, has met with the Iranian ambassador in Baghdad on a couple of occasions. Those discussions, according to Ambassador Crocker, have been totally unproductive, because Iran is hell-bent on the destruction of Israel, they’re hell-bent on driving us out of Iraq, they’re hell-bent on supporting terrorist organizations, and as serious as anything to American families, they’re sending explosive devices into Iraq that are killing American soldiers.

JG: Tell me how engaged you would be as President in Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, and give me a couple of names of plausible Middle East envoys.

JM: I would have a hands-on approach. I would be the chief negotiator. I have been there for thirty years. I know the leaders, I know them extremely well. Ehud Barak and I have gone back thirty years. I knew Olmert when he was mayor of Jerusalem. I’ve met many times with Netanyahu. I’ve met with Mahmoud Abbas.

In terms of envoys, there are a large number of people who could be extremely effective, and I apologize for ducking the question, but it would have to be dictated by the state of relations at the time. For example, we know that there were behind-the-scenes conversations Israel was having with Syria. Now it’s broken into the public arena. So it would depend on the state of things. If they were more advanced in talks, which they are not, with Hamas, then you need someone like a mechanic. If it’s someone who needs to lay out a whole framework, it would have to be someone who commands the respect of both sides, someone who has an impact on world opinion.

JG: What is the difference between an American president negotiating with Ahmadinejad and Ehud Olmert negotiating with the Syrians?

JM: You don’t see him sitting down opposite Bashar, do you? (Bashar al-Assad is president of Syria.) I mean, that’s the point here. It was perfectly fine that Ryan Crocker spoke with the Iranian ambassador in Baghdad. The point is you don’t give legitimacy by lending prestige of a face-to-face meeting, with no preconditions.

JG: But Obama has shifted off that position.

JM: Sure, and the next time he sees where he’s wrong, maybe he’ll shift again. The point is is that he doesn’t understand. Look, in the primary, he was unequivocal in his statements. And now he realizes that it’s not a smart thing to say. I didn’t say he wasn’t a smart politician.

JG: Do you think that settlements keep Israel and the Palestinians from making peace?

JM: There’s a list of issues that separate them, from water, to the right of return, to settlements. Look at the Oslo Accords, which basically laid out a roadmap for addressing these major issues. And settlements is one of them, but certainly one of the issues right now is the shelling of Sderot, which I visited. As you know, they’re shelling from across the border. If the United States was being rocketed across one of our borders, that would probably gain prominence as an issue.

JG: Do you believe that Israel will have to go into Gaza in force to deal with the rockets, and if Israel did, would you support it?

JM: It depends on what you mean by force. They’ve responded with air strikes, and identifying Hamas leaders and, you know, quote, responding. Would they respond with massive force? I don’t know. I know from my conversations with them that they are deeply concerned. They’re a democracy. How would an American government, how would American public opinion respond, if there were constant shelling, and kids had fifteen seconds – fifteen seconds – to get into a bomb shelter. I don’t know what the government of Israel is going to do. It somewhat depends on whether these attacks will discontinue or if other things happen. I did get the distinct impression, nothing specific, but I got the impression that the patience of the Israeli government and the people is growing short.

JG: Let’s go back to Iran. Some critics say that America conflates its problem with Iran with Israel’s problem with Iran. Iran is not threatening the extinction of America, it’s threatening the extinction of Israel. Why should America have a military option for dealing with Iran when the threat is mainly directed against Israel?

JM: The United States of America has committed itself to never allowing another Holocaust. That’s a commitment that the United States has made ever since we discovered the horrendous aspects of the Holocaust.

In addition to that, I would respond by saying that I think these terrorist organizations that they sponsor, Hamas and the others, are also bent, at least long-term, on the destruction of the United States of America. That’s why I agree with General Petraeus that Iraq is a central battleground. Because these Shiite militias are sending in these special groups, as they call them, sending weapons in, to remove United States influence and to drive us out of Iraq and thereby achieve their ultimate goals. We’ve heard the rhetoric -- the Great Satan, etc. It’s a nuance, their being committed to the destruction of the State of Israel, and their long-term intentions toward us.

JG: Do you think their intention is the actual destruction of America?

JM: It’s hard for me to say what their intentions are, but the effect – If they were able to drive us out of Iraq, and al Qaeda established a base there, and the Shiite militias erupted and the Iranian influence was expanded, which to my mind is what would happen, then the consequences for American national security would be profound. I don’t know if their intention is to destroy America and what we stand for, but I think the consequences of them succeeding in the destruction of the state of Israel and their continued support for terrorist organizations – all of these would have profound national security consequences.

JG: A question about democratization in the Middle East. Imagine a continuum, Brent Scowcroft on one end, Paul Wolfowitz on the other. Where do you fall on that continuum, five years after the invasion of Iraq?

JM: I think that we’ve got to always balance the realism of a situation with idealism. I’m committed to that fundamental belief that we’re all created equal and endowed with inalienable rights. But there are times when realism has to enter into the equation as well. If you look at Darfur, we don’t want this to go on, but how do we stop it? And what would the consequences of our initial intrusion be? After the initial success, what are the long-term consequences?

I enjoy hearing this debate. There’s no one I love more in the world than Brent Scowcroft. He’s one of the most selfless people I’ve ever seen, never a trace of personal ambition, which is the rarest thing in Washington. But I lean also toward the historic idealism of America. Which means that every situation that confronts us, we have to try to maintain that balance. Have I always been right? No. But I try to learn from the lessons of history.

JG: You bring up an interesting question about the Holocaust, to which you say never again. But do you have an absolute commitment to stop genocide wherever it occurs?

JM: That has to be the fundamental goal, but it has to be tempered by the idea that you have to actually be able to do it, that you can succeed. If you fail in one of these efforts, that encourages others, and increases feelings of isolationism and protectionism in America. It’s hard to convince Americans to send young Americans into harm’s way, as it should be.

JG: It sounds like you’re talking about Iraq.

JM: Well, we haven’t talked about the four years of mishandling this war, which has been devastating, in particular to the families.

JG: A final question: Senator Obama talked about how his life was influenced by Jewish writers, Philip Roth, Leon Uris. How about you?

JM: There’s Elie Wiesel, and Victor Frankl. I think about Frankl all the time. “Man’s Search for Meaning” is one of the most profound things I’ve ever read in my life. And maybe on a little lighter note, “War and Remembrance” and “Winds of War” are my two absolute favorite books. I can tell you that one of my life’s ambitions is to meet Herman Wouk. “War and Remembrance” for me, it’s the whole thing.

Then there’s Joe Lieberman, who lives a life of his religion, and who does it in the most humble way.

JG: Not a big Philip Roth fan?

JM: No, I’m not. Leon Uris I enjoyed. Victor Frankl, that’s important. I read it before my captivity. It made me feel a lot less sorry for myself, my friend. A fundamental difference between my experience and the Holocaust was that the Vietnamese didn’t want us to die. They viewed us as a very valuable asset at the bargaining table. It was the opposite in the Holocaust, because they wanted to exterminate you. Sometimes when I felt sorry for myself, which was very frequently, I thought, “This is nothing compared to what Victor Frankl experienced.”

[Cross-posted from The Atlantic]

It is getting harder and harder to find leaders in the Kadima-Labor government who are not calling for a massive invasion of Gaza. Here, in this heartbreaking video, is Israeli Interior Minister Meir Shitreet, responding to the latest barrage of Qassam rockets in Sderot. An 8-year-old boy, Oshri Twito, and his 19-year-old bother, Rami, were critically injured. The pair were walking in the street on a Saturday evening (and imagine, if you can bear it, the affection with which an older brother watches over his little brother on a Saturday evening). Oshri lost his leg and is still in intensive care; his big brother’s legs were seriously damaged; their parents are being treated for shock.

 

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Reason's Michael Young explains why the NIE is almost besides the point in the ongoing U.S.-Iran conflict:  

For example, what is the U.S. doing about Iran's alliance with Syria, and their joint patronage of Hamas and Hizbullah? Hamas is dead set on wrecking American efforts to bring about a settlement of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and several months ago the movement mounted a successful coup against the Fatah movement in Gaza. Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal lives in Damascus, is a frequent visitor to Tehran, and although Syria will send sporadic signals that it is displeased with the Islamist group, this is chaff designed to keep alive the illusion that Syria and Iran are on different wavelengths. Nothing will divide Syria from Iran when the relationship brings so many foreign supplicants to Damascus with offers of concessions to President Bashar Assad, if only he would consider abandoning Iran. Assad takes the concessions, offers none of his own, and yet the visitors still keep coming.

We don't hear much about the U.N. investigation into Rafiq Hariri's assassination anymore. And now that Syria has -- in all likelihood -- expanded its 'wet work' in Lebanon to include murdering apolitical military generals, it seems nothing will stop the Alawite regime from attempting a full-scale reconquest of its war-weary neighbor.  Iran's hand in all this is clear: Surround Iraq with terror proxies, and nestle right up to Israel with same.

Moreover, there is no guarantee that the Israelis will not undercut their role as junior intelligence partner to the U.S. and simply go ahead with a preemptive strike on Iran's nuclear facilities. As Shmuel Rosner reported earlier in the week in Slate, Israel was completely demoralized by the NIE and, as the headline of his piece phrased it, "anxious nations don't compromise." Rosner concludes, however, that the Jewish state will be unable to act on its own without the not-so-tacit approval of the Pentagon:

With U.S. forces deployed all over the region, there are tens of thousands of American soldiers who would be at risk from an Iranian response, were Israel to attack the nuclear installations at Natanz and Arak. And anyway, the Israeli air force would need the U.S. codes that would open the flight path and prevent a collision between friendly forces.

All true. But confronted with the choice between "existential threat" and making things more difficult for overseas American servicemen, I wonder if Tel Aviv wouldn't to jeopardize, at least temporarily, its strongest alliance, even if the consequences turn out to be far worse than those of Suez in 1956. 

[Following in the vein of Jewcy's resident Sufi ex-Trot Stephen Schwartz about a working definition of "fascism" as it relates to Islamic militancy, here is -- or was -- my take on the question. Published a few months ago.]

When Orwell, in his imperishable essay "Politics and the English Language," said that the term fascism had degenerated in the hands of the correct-thinking but sloppy-writing public to mean anything that is undesirable , he was surely onto something -- in 1946. But there came a moment in history when fascism dropped out of the lexicon of abused catchwords, indeed, out of the lexicon entirely. After Hitler and Mussolini were defeated, and after the postwar dictators -- Franco, Salazar, even De Gaulle -- died off naturally, who wielded the epithet except a few graying manes on the left who'd experienced fascism first-hand, or a new generation of pseudo-radicals who'd simply wished they had for enhanced credibility?

In the late 80's, Susan Sontag's notorious formulation that Soviet Communism was "fascism with a human face" did a great thing for reviving the term with ironic dash. Then came 9/11 and the democratic call of the hour was to fight "fascism with an Islamic face," as Hitch termed it, or "Islamofascism," the portmanteau -- and slightly denatured -- version of this.

Eustonistas, myself included, now use the term fascism with consistency and, I hope, specificity. Yet rarely has a working definition of the phenomenon been offered. The danger here becomes that overuse will again bring us to a point where an invaluable and arresting term begins to connote anything undesirable. Al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah are surely undesirable, ergo, they're all fascist. (You can judge the energy of any side in a world-historic struggle by the anemia of its rhetoric.)

In "Democracy and Fascism," Trotsky battles the self-negating and improvisational Stalinist definition and offers a proper anatomy of the ideology:

At the moment that the "normal" police and military resources of the bourgeois dictatorship, together with their parliamentary screens, no longer suffice to hold society in a state of equilibrium -- the turn of the fascist regime arrives. Through the fascist agency, capitalism sets in motion the masses of the crazed petty bourgeoisie, and bands of the declassed and demoralized Lumpenproletariat; all the countless human beings from finance capital itself has brought to desperation and frenzy. From fascism the bourgeoisie demands a thorough job; once it has resorted to methods of civil war, it insists on having peace for a period of years. And the fascist agency by utilizing the petty bourgeoisie as a battering ram, by overwhelming all obstacles in its path, does a thorough job. After fascism is victorious, finance capital gathers into its hands, as in the vise of steel, directly and immediately, all the organs and institutions of sovereignty, the executive, administrative and educational powers of the state: the entire state apparatus together with the army, the municipalities, the universities, the schools, the press, the trade unions, and the co-operatives. When a state turns fascist, it doesn't only mean that the forms and methods of government are changed in accordance with the patterns set by Mussolini--the changes in this sphere ultimately play a minor role--but it means, first of all for the most part, that the workers' organizations are annihilated; that the proletariat is reduced to an amorphous state; and that a system of administration is created which penetrates deeply into the masses and which serves to frustrate the independent crystallization of the proletariat. Therein precisely is the gist of fascism.

Useful here are the Marxist categories, which the modern left has either forgotten or ignored in its attempt to equate Bin Ladenism with liberation theology. Roughly translated, Al Qaeda is the vanguard or militant wing of the latter-day wretched of the earth in the Middle East. Yet as any sociological study of Islamic terrorist groups will attest, most Al Qaeda members are well-educated and quite "petty bourgeois" in background. They might try to exploit working class, or better say impoverished, sensibilities in their propaganda, but one has only to remember Bin Laden's famed relationship to Communism to see that his is hardly an attempt to empower those who aren't Saudi industrial billionaires or believers in the One True God.

As for other militias and terror groups saddled with the f-word, it's interesting that leftists overcome with nostalgia for old struggles fail to remember the platforms upon which those struggles were waged. Nor do they apply the materialist lessons of the past to the present. Tariq Ali, for instance, celebrates Trotsky, yet thinks of Haniyah, Nasrallah and Ahmadinejad as champions of the downtrodden, not bothering to spot the contradictions in their economic imperatives and the class segments of their populations to which they most appeal.

Indeed, Ahmadinejad's toughest opponents are the Iranian proletariat, which are organized into exactly the kinds of democratic-civil trade unions mentioned above. In December, prominent members of the Public Bus Transportation Company Union in Tehran were jailed for their dissidence. Organized labor in Iran has also been out front in its denunciation of the mullah regime, and has likewise paid a high price for it. But of course you won't hear a peep from the old comrades about this stifling of democracy, which is homegrown and not in the least influenced by American intervention.

Hamas -- or its precursor organization, the Mujamma' -- more or less sprung right out of the Palestinian university system and aims to control the entire apparatus of the state, including the army, press, municipalities and education of the Palestinians. (Sharia law mandates such comprehensive integration of civic and religious institutions.) As for its relationship with the workers, just a few days ago the Deputy Secretary General of the Palestinian Federation of General Trade Unions had his home attacked by terrorist gunmen. Of course, the current PA is not lifting a finger over this domestic crime. Might it be because the PFGTU, internationalist in scope and solidarity, has been resistant to infiltration by Hamas, a "national" liberation organization?

All of which doesn't even address the "declassed and demoralized" gangster and criminal elements which comprise these groups' natural and most violent constituencies. Plus, the main thrust of Trotsky's great polemic was to discredit the Comintern's shabby and sinister moral equivalence of Bruning with Hitler. The official Stalinist line during the rise of Nazism (when German social democrats were known as "social fascists") can't help but remind of what you now hear about Bush being the identical twin of Bin Laden...

Of course, one doesn't have to buy into every facet of a dead revolutionary's analysis of a 20th century political pathology. But a left that fails to see certain classical trends recapitulating themselves in the 21st century is a myopic and doomed left, to say the least.

Johann Hari has a very interesting and thoughtful review of Nick Cohen’s “What’s Left?” up on his website.

Hari is a seldom less than compelling columnist, though I don’t share his politics, and his comments on Cohen’s [excellent] book are well worth exploring. However, as much as his criticisms of the Eustonite left (with which I am broadly in sympathy) occasionally hit the mark, there’s an instructive passage towards the end of his article which exposes the essential weakness (for me) of much of the Left, particularly when it comes to the Middle East:

He [Cohen] writes apropos Iraq: "You have to choose which side you are on, and those who don't usually end up as the biggest villains of all."

The obvious response is - why? Why do you have to pick a side between two forces that repel you? There are plenty of conflicts where no sensible person would pick a side: the Crusades, for example. Indeed, Cohen himself did not "pick a side" in the Cold War. He sensibly opposed both the US-led assaults on democrats in Iran, Guatemala, and Congo, and the Soviet-led assaults on democrats in Hungary, Czecholslovakia and Afghanistan.

This injuction to "pick a side" is Cohen's way of ironing out the cognitive dissonance that comes from being aware of crimes by the Bush adminstration, but supporting them anyway.

I don’t know whether Nick Cohen “picked a side” in the Cold War or not: but if he didn’t, he should have, and those on the Left who didn’t – or, worse, picked the other side - were guilty of the same moral confusion as their contemporary counterparts in organisations like the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND), whose response to Iranian ducking and weaving on the nuclear issue betrays the most extraordinary hypocrisy. (More of them later.)

In pointing out that Cohen opposed both US and Soviet aggression during the Cold War Hari is, ironically, making Cohen’s point for him: if the Left is to have any relevance in the modern world – if it’s to stand for anything at all – it surely stands for denouncing human rights abuses wherever they occur – Gitmo or Tehran – and standing up for democracy everywhere, not just in countries like Egypt and Saudi Arabia that are perceived as US client states but also in countries like Zimbabwe and North Korea, whose disgusting human rights abuses seem not to trouble the radar of a surprising proportion of today’s Leftists. A principled Left must stand up for these values as universal, not apply them selectively whilst, almost in the same breath, lauding tinpot dictators from Belarus to Venezuela just because they’re willing to say rude things about George Bush.

We are all Hezb nowAnyone who watched the anti-war marchers turn out in force last summer, during the Israeli bombardment of Lebanon, with their nauseating “We are all Hezbollah now” banners, may reasonably ask why no-one is marching about Zimbabwe. Why do Darfur marches get hundreds or thousands, rather than hundreds of thousands? And how much bigger would those demonstrations magically become if the US announced plans to invade Sudan; how many leftist groups would suddenly crawl out of the woodwork to express an interest in that miserable and repugnant genocide - express an interest for the very first time?

If you doubt what I say, read Cohen here on the left’s betrayal of Iranian trade unionists, and the account of how CND invited the Iranian ambassador to speak at their annual conference (savour the irony!). When exiled Iranian leftists in London showed up to protest this embrace of the brutal, “fascistic” regime in Tehran, they were thrown out. Or consider the grotesque hypocrisy of my old MP and occasional sparring partner “Gorgeous” George Galloway, a target of Cohen and Hari both, who thinks nothing of defending quasi-fascist regimes all over the world so long as they are anti-American in their outlook, and who infamously said that the assassination of Tony Blair would be “morally justifiable”.

To claim a moral equivalence between a regime like that in Iran, which executes homosexuals and stones adulterers to death, or North Korea, where scientists test chemical weapons on political prisoners and their families, with liberal democracies like the US or Britain, however flawed and often worthy of condemnation their policies may be, is worse than a misuse of language; it’s deliberate moral blindness. And to reflexively and uncritically take the side of the some of the worst regimes on earth in the name of “anti-imperialism” is not just forty years out of date; it’s a moral obscenity, and we owe it to every imprisoned pro-democracy activist and murdered dissident to scream it from whatever rooftop we can find to clamber onto.

Seen from this perspective, taking the side of the West, even a West that breaches human rights itself, doesn't make us guilty of a "cognitive dissonance"; on the contrary, it's an absolute precondition for being taken seriously, be it as a commentator, activist, or politically engaged citizen. I don't abhor Guantanamo, or torture, or the assault on civil liberties in both the US and Britain, because I believe us to be no better than the suicide-murderers ranged against us. My despair and fury at these actions stems from precisely the opposite root; that our way of life is precious and worth protecting; that these abuses are a standing rebuke to our cause, not a necessary compromise in its defence; and that if we surrender the moral high ground then, in a very real and immediate sense, we have already lost.

When you are facing a nihilist death-cult like Al-Qaeda, to which death and destruction is not so much the means to an end as an end in itself, and an ideology which may fairly be described as fascist, I don't expect you to subscribe to Bush's "they hate our freedoms" tripe; but I do expect you to have a functioning moral compass which is capable of telling right from wrong. Cohen and Hari, much as they differ on some pretty fundamental points, both clearly do. But a lot of their comrades seem to have misplaced theirs.

I can't resist making one final observation. When I was younger, back in the 80's, there were of course Palestinian flags at Left-wing marches, but when you bought a copy of Living Marxism (she was cute, OK?) or went to a demo, you would have seen headlines and banners everywhere urging, "Free Kurdistan".

You don't see them too much any more. Why, you may ask, don't you see "Free Kurdistan" placards at demonstrations these days? Because we did.

I guess I must have missed the celebrations down at Living Marxism.

For a while now, it's been a half-joking and half-serious suggestion on my part: fight terror by making female Muslim pop stars the next J.Lo and Beyonce. Right off the bat, seeing a Lebanese Shi'a who looks like this will cast cultures where radicalism thrives in a different light and pose some interesting questions. Does Nasrallah like Haifa or does he want to kill her? Given the choice between international superstardom or Hezbollah's defeat of Israel, what would she choose? Given the choice between martyrdom and smooching Haifa (who, unfortunately for them is now married), how many of Hezbollah's men would still raise the yellow flag?

Courtney C. Radsch, a columnist for a magazine called Arabisto recently wondered whether or not Haifa Wehbe could help Bush develop a more nuanced understanding of Lebanese politics. Why does somebody like Wehbe support Hezbollah? Radsch says:

...ordinary and sexy people around the world (not just extremists) believe that if somebody attacks you in your own homeland, as the Israelis did beginning with the Hula massacre in 1948, and subsequent incursions and attacks in 1968, 1978, 1981, 1982, 1985, 1992, 1993, 1996 and 2006, you have the right to defend yourself against aggression.

Yadda, yadda, yadda. Of course this line about resistance and social services and Lebanon's complex political milieu couldn't be more worn-out. It's generally offered up by folks whose understanding of ethics runs something like this:

I assure you, the "battle" simply isn't as black and white as Bush wants us to believe: freedom vs. radicalism, violence vs. peace, extremists vs. moderates. It's much more nuanced than that.

These aren't political statements--they are philosophical ones. Radsch should notice, however, that most political struggles are won because a clear and unmistakable distinction is made between the doers of wrong and the seekers of justice. Take one of the most successful non-violent struggles in recent history--who is willing to say that the battle between African Americans and their oppressors couldn't or shouldn't have been seen as a battle between the hateful and the hated? Certainly when the Brimingham campaign began, some Alabama business owners were hurt. Maybe some of their families suffered. Some of the shopkeepers blamed the protesters and harbored hatred for them based partly on their economic difficulty which may likely have become mixed up with some notion of racial superiority--not just on pure unadulterated racial hate. They didn't only hate the civil rights activists because they were black--the shopkeepers felt the activists were in the wrong for breaking the law and blocking the free flow of commerce--which they were. These things are always complex. Congratulations to all who think they are being revelatory by stating the obvious.

Complex though situations may be however, no names of violent civil rights activists come immediately to mind because history does not remember their struggle with great approval. The point here is not to suggest that the struggle in this region should take up the non-violent tactics of the American Civil Rights Movement. It is only to point out that ironically it is those who take for granted these complexities that seem more able to make reasonable ethical judgments. It is also to point out--yet again--that a group's methods and intentions matter to any discussion of whether or not they are a friend or a foe. After all isn't the argument here for nuance? Good people do bad things and bad people do good things. Big effin' deal--that isn't news. It's after we agree on this that the meaty questions must be asked.

A more interesting way Haifa might help would be this: the West generally sees Muslims chanting frantically, wielding machine guns, or beheading journalists. Disciples of Edward Said will hate me for saying so, but the Western world sorely lacks an image of Muslims as sensual, beautiful, or erotic people. But there's nothing Orientalist about bringing this up unless one suggests that sensuality flows essentially from Muslimness. The West is overfamiliar with Islam's Thanatos facade.

Islam requests modesty of dress, but it does not require the radical desexualization of its adherents. To the contrary, it was originally meant to be a system of life designed for maximizing the joys of conjugal relationship. Unfortunately, the western media has been one hundred percent complicit in jihadists' attempts at radically desexualizing Islam.

If my readers were to remind me that what Britney, Christina, J.Lo and Beyonce have come to represent isn't anything worth wishing on anyone else, I'd agree. But here is where a bit of recolonization could do the west a world of good. Paris Hilton is a watermark in poor taste for women in commercial pop culture and her friend Nicole does for good body image what Paris did for healthy sexuality. Each cranked it up to an extreme that's both condemnable and embarrassing. Compared to them, Haifa Wehbe represents a female sexuality and body-type that isn't characterized by XXX hotel room cumshots and fashion magazine-induced anorexia.

Her politics when it comes to Hezbollah suck. Her political power is symbolic--sex symbolic, to be precise. As a titan among Middle Eastern sex symbols, she defies certain elements of western degeneracy while simultaneously proving to the mass of misinformed people that Muslims aren't part of some inherently medieval war-prone desert species that keeps itself wrapped up in rags.

 

One Wallace Shawn's dictum in Princess Bride -- "Never fight a land war in Asia!" -- leaves everything to chance when it comes to waging combat in the Middle East with the use of Asian ballistics. According to the Jerusalem Post,

Hizbullah has amassed an undisclosed number of Fatah-110 rockets, which could theoretically be fired at Tel Aviv, according to a report in Britain's Sunday Times. The projectile, an upgraded Chinese assault rocket, has a 500-lb warhead and a range of 200 kilometers.

And Nasrallah's goons have got deep bunkers for hiding out from Israeli aircraft should a third Lebanon War be in the offing. The open secret of the second, of course, was that a land war was precisely what was needed to rout Hezbollah. Olmert didn't want to risk more IDF lives than he thought was necessary, and so his approval rating is lower than Bush's, and Hezbollah digs further into the earth and infrastructure of an enfeebled Mideast democracy.

Justin Raimondo believes, with emphatic certainty, that "Iran is no threat to Israel, and that there is no danger of Iran dropping nukes on Tel Aviv." Likewise he says that "Iran, with or without nuclear weapons, represents no threat to America." Far be it from me to take Mr. Raimondo seriously when he says such things – his contributions to last week's exchange were studded with so many hateful condemnations, bizarre declarations, and quarter-baked ideas that doing so would require me to empty my brain of everything I've learned about both the Middle East and foreign policy. But these two platitudes do serve as a good jumping-off point for discussing the true nature of the Iranian threat, which is, I believe, why the editors of Jewcy asked me to contribute to this debate.

Iran is indeed a threat to both the United States and to Israel – but the threat does not come in the cartoonish form of Mr. Raimondo's fevered imagination, with Iranian bombers nuking Tel Aviv and Iranian ICBM's rocketing their way toward New York. Those scenarios are red herrings intended to make Raimondo's task of turning America and Israel into the world's leading belligerents much easier.

The actual threat posed by a nuclear Iran involves the manner in which such a development would upset the balance of power in the Middle East, which no doubt for Mr. Raimondo is a boring subject as it does not provide ready opportunities for Israel Lobby hysteria and mushroom cloud fantasies. To understand the consequences of a nuclear Iran, we have to look to the recent history of Middle East power arrangements.

Before the American-Israeli alliance was solidified in the late 1960's and early 1970's, the Middle East -- especially the eastern Mediterranean half of it -- was home to regular warfare. This bloodshed arose from the conviction among the Arab nations that they could destroy Israel, which they tried to do repeatedly: in 1948, 1956, 1967, and 1973. Even though some of the Arab countries were allied with the Soviet Union, Israel repulsed the invaders, and in the latter two wars even captured territory from the attacking armies. In doing so Israel created for itself a reputation as the most militarily competent country in its half of the region.

And then, as Martin Kramer explains, "the United States began to look at Israel as a potential strategic ally. Israel appeared to be the strongest, most reliable and most cost-effective bulwark against Soviet penetration of the Middle East. It could defeat any combination of Soviet clients on its own and, in so doing, humiliate the Soviet Union and drive thinking Arabs out of the Soviet camp."

In contrast to the benefits that Israel's victories provided the United States in its maneuverings against the Soviets, the 1973 war did create something of a crisis for America, in the form of the Arab oil embargo. Having suffered a gasoline shortage at home, American strategists decided to attempt to impose peace in the region by showing so much support for Israel that the Arab states would henceforth refuse to challenge it. And this strategy has been a resounding success: Since 1973 there have been no more wars between Israel and Arab countries. This security arrangement even ended up prying Egypt away from the Soviets and into an alliance, later joined by Jordan, with America.

What does all of this have to do with Iran today? It has to do with the Islamic Republic's prospects for success in its endeavor to undermine this American-enforced security architecture. Iran is trying to destabilize the Middle East by creating its own set of alliances and clients that it hopes will rival America's. This is why it funds Hezbollah in Lebanon and now Hamas and Islamic Jihad in the Palestinian territories; has cultivated an alliance with Syria that seeks to engulf Lebanon and allow Hezbollah free reign there; and provides weapons, money, and leadership to insurgents in Iraq.

Iran's intentions are clear: it wants America out of the Middle East, so that it can control the Persian Gulf and manipulate the rest of the region through its alliances and proxies. Are these goals going to be easier or harder to accomplish with the benefit of nuclear deterrence? The answer is obvious, and it is the real reason why preventing a nuclear Iran is both in the American and Israeli interest. The short-term stakes, though, are higher for Israel (and Lebanon, for that matter). A nuclear Iran allied with Hezbollah to the north and Hamas and Islamic Jihad to the Southwest and East would dramatically embolden Israel's enemies, suppress foreign investment and tourism in Israel, and over time would cause the economic and psychological attrition of the Jewish state -- with no bombing runs over Tel Aviv necessary.

And so the true disappointment of Israel's war against Hezbollah last summer was its failure to act as a competent American client by dominating the part of the region it is responsible for keeping quiet. The war against Hezbollah was a particularly important conflict for Israel to win, because Hezbollah is more than just another disruptive presence in the Levant -- it is a vanguard force in the Iranian arsenal that is attempting to make American involvement in the region as costly as possible. It is one of the means by which Iran can summon a counterattack should the U.S. or Israel strike its nuclear facilities, and it is the primary asset of the Syrian-Iranian project to co-opt Lebanon, defeat the American-allied nascent democracy there, and bring uncontested Iranian power to Israel's northern border.

In one of his many dumb asides, Raimondo says that people who favor preventing Iran, by force if necessary, from acquiring nuclear weapons "don't have any compunction about throwing the entire region into chaos." This is probably the most wrong-headed of his many ridiculous assertions. Western acquiescence to a nuclear Iran would do perhaps more than anything else to throw the Middle East into chaos. It would shatter the balance of power that has governed the region, however shakily, for nearly forty years. Second-tier powers, such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan, would be sent scrambling for their own nuclear weapons and new alliances, and the United States would almost certainly be forced from the region. Raise your hand if you're in favor of handing over control of the U.S. economy to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Apologies to the Snakes: Walid JumblattThe moody Druze dishes on MEMRI TV. For a kitsch Leninist, he's pretty funny:

Walid Jumblatt: We are facing someone [Iran] who has an army, money, and a political plan for the Arab Islamic Middle East, and one of its frontline bases is Hassan Nasrallah and Hizbullah in Lebanon. When we consider their ideological writings, such as the books by Hazem Saghiyeh and Naim Al-Qassem, we realize that we and they cannot meet half way.

Interviewer: It is impossible to meet half way with this plan?

Walid Jumblatt: Yes, because this is a plan of abolishment.

Interviewer: Abolishment of whom?

Walid Jumblatt: It is a plan to establish a Hizbullah state in Lebanon, at the expense of pluralism, of the Taif Agreement, of free economy, and of the free press.

[…]

[Hizbullah] said its weapons were “sacred weapons,” and we disagreed. Now they are talking about "divine weapons." A truck [with Hizbullah weapons] was driving around Beirut – and it was confiscated in Al-Hazmiya. [Hizbullah] said it was loaded with "divine weapons," and demanded their return. With all due respect to Hassan Nasrallah and the others, we participated, unfortunately, in the civil war in the past, and we know that the range of 60 mm mortars is 500 meters at most. It is meant for urban warfare, not for Haifa, "beyond Haifa," or "beyond beyond Haifa." It is meant for urban warfare.

[...]

We see their rallies. These are not rallies of sorrow and grief for the days of Karbala. There is a kind of activity that is legitimate to express grief over Hussein, but when you see how they salute with their fists... It reminds me of the films by director Leni Riefenstahl, who used to film Adolf Hitler's rallies. Adolf Hitler, no more no less... When Hassan Nasrallah speaks, he speaks to himself. He doesn't speak to the public, but to himself...

Interviewer: How come?

Walid Jumblatt: Who is he addressing? Let's forget about Hassan Nasrallah for a moment. There is nothing more dangerous than mass rallies, because anybody might forget himself there.

Interviewer: Including you?

Walid Jumblatt: Yes, including me. Nothing is more dangerous.

Interviewer: Do you regret what you said on February 14, 2007?

Walid Jumblatt: No, but the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty against Animals contacted me, and said that they reject the comparison of snakes, whales, and wild beasts to Bashar Al-Assad. I apologize to that society. But I don't regret anything else I said.

 

Ballistic Viewfinder: Israeli missile targets a Lebanon building for destructionA new study produced by an Israeli research group (and, unfortunately, disseminated by the AJC, which should stay out of this one) argues that Israel's military assault on Lebanon over the summer was not "disproportionate" given that moral ratios go out the window the instant one side starts using civilians as shields:

In several other instances, Israel bombed vehicle convoys that were trying to leave the combat zone in southern Lebanon, killing many civilians. Human Rights Watch, a New York-based advocacy group, said shortly before the war ended that it had documented the deaths of 27 Lebanese civilians killed while trying to flee.

Kenneth Roth, the executive director of Human Rights Watch, wrote shortly after the war that the Israeli military “seemed to assume that because it gave warnings to civilians to evacuate southern Lebanon, anyone who remained was a Hezbollah fighter.”

Nowhere in this Times piece is how the war might have been executed differently had Israel mounted a stronger and more comprehensive ground campaign. Instead -- and as any many pro-Israel bloggers and commentators have been banging on about for months -- the ineffectual and devastating air campaign not only spared too many Hezbollah fighters but made distinguishing them from Lebanese innocents all but impossible. (Phoning households where Nasrallah's goons were thought to be taking refuge and telling the owners, "You have 10 minutes to skedaddle before we powder the place," may seem magnanimous in theory but it doesn't quite work when a) those same goons can probably overhear the warning, b) your being held hostage by them axiomatically limits your possible escape routes.)

As it happens, months before those two soldiers were kidnapped and this whole conflict inaugurated, Israel had wargamed a scenario where it went to war with Hezbollah. The only difference between the rehearsal and the show was that deployed boots compensated for dropped payloads in the former. The result was an almost 5-to-1 loss of IDF troops to Hezbollah fighters, which was deemed unacceptable and which is why Lebanon now looks like Sarajevo.

 

How many readers of this magazine would find themselves in agreement with Bill Kristol even outside the charitable space of the holiday season?

This is the editor of the Weekly Standard arguing, with his regime change doubles-partner Robert Kagan, against the Baker-Hamilton Commission's recommendations for Iraq:

It's not as if the Baker commission has accomplished nothing, however. Although its recommendations will have no effect on American policy going forward, they have already had a very damaging effect throughout the world, and especially in the Middle East and in Iraq. For the Iraq Study Group, aided by supportive American media, has successfully conveyed the impression to everyone at home and abroad that the United States is about to withdraw from Iraq. This has weakened American allies and strengthened American enemies. It has exacerbated the problems in Iraq, as all the various factions in that country begin to prepare for the "inevitable" American retreat. Now it will require enormous efforts by the president and his advisers to dispel the disastrous impression that the Baker commission has quite deliberately created and will continue to foster in the weeks ahead. At home and abroad, people have been led to believe that Jim Baker and not the president was going to call the shots in Iraq from now on.

That paragraph precedes one in which Kristol and Kagan pretty contentedly show that whatever the findings of this headline-generating body of "wise men," the president has given every indication that he will not a) play nice with Iran, b) do likewise with Syria. Big mistake, neocon dreaming, the Death of Diplomacy and all that, you say -- but here is Ha'aretz contributer Shmuel Rosner in Slate, discussing the one country, historically more amenable to democracy than Iraq, that K&K failed to mention:

Some Lebanese are waiting, somewhat anxiously, for the Baker-Hamilton committee's recommendations this Wednesday. They have zero confidence in the help they might get in the future from an American administration. "If the Syrians help Bush in Iraq, he could sell us out in a second," one of them told me. "Exactly as his father sold out the Kurds to Saddam 15 years ago."

Quite. What price, then, realpolitik, or the coddling of the only remaining Baathist government in the Middle East? (If a rapproachment with Syria is in fact in the works, then this would be not just a replay of the shameful sell-out of the Kurds and Shia in '91, but also reminiscent of the Churchill-Roosevelt concession to Stalin of Poland, whose violated sovereignty formed the basis for Allied intervention in the first place.)

Some principles are worth keeping and reaffirming, even at the cost of "stability." And what are the odds that a Hezbollah-controlled country south of Israel will be anything even remotely resembling stable?

We completely support Syria's war of terror: Pro-Hezbollah ralliersOthers chanted “Ahmed Fatfat is a Jew,” referring to the minister of sports and youth, who had been acting interior minister.

Long live people power and all that. So Sheik Hassan Nasrallah convinces his followers and the quisling pro-Syrian factionalists who've made common cause with him -- like Gen. Michel Aoun, a former exiled reformist and Christian leader of the Patriotic Free Movement -- to demonstrate peacefully today and wave only the cedar flag of Lebanon, not Hezbollah's more evocative yellow and green ensign of a fist clutching a Kalashnikov. Still, chants like the one cited above were pretty par for the course even as the protesters made their central plaint "clean" government. The Lebanese blogsophere was having none of this bullshit, however -- an encouraging sign if the internet is any kind of bellwether for popular opinion. Beirut's Daily Star newspaper shows how stupid and sinister these protesters really are:

Other popular slogans included: "100 percent! 100 percent! 100 percent! We are the majority!" and "We withstood and fought for our country, and won't let anyone shut us up!"

More like 25%, but who's counting?

I will say this: It was very clever indeed of Nasrallah to offer such a funhouse mirror image of the March 14 opposition rally of last year, which put a (possibly temporary) end to Syrian occupation. Hezbollah is, after all, angling for political dominance and realignment with Damascus. Today's massive outpouring of support for such an outcome makes the summer's devastating war with Israel seem even more calculated and deliberate.

Druze leader Walid Jumblatt is quite right to call the day's events tantamount to an attempted coup.

Jumblatt called on Hizbullah and Amal ministers who resigned in November to return to the Cabinet in order to "confirm their support for the international tribunal, for Resolution 1701 and for the Paris III donor conference."

The fact that they won't only underscores Hezbollah's real intent, to stoke and profit from domestic indignation at a time when international justice is near at hand.

If things disintegrate even further, and Syria is "invited" back into Lebanon in the event of a Hezbollah takeover, then the U.S. should consider a rapid withdrawal of forces from Iraq -- and redeploy them to Beirut, where it's not too late to save a gasping democracy.

 

Will Lebanon also descend into civil war? If close to a million protesters rallying behind Nasrallah have anything to say about it, it will. The Daily Star reports:

Opposition groups led by Hezbollah have mobilized their bases for the afternoon protest and were making arrangements to bus supporters from all corners of Lebanon to downtown Beirut for the massive show of popular support.

Heavily armed soldiers and police closed all roads leading to the sprawling complex in downtown, feverishly unfurling barbed wire and placing barricades to prevent any protests from spilling over into the stone-walled, brick-roofed historic building during what some newspapers billed as the "great showdown" between the government and the opposition.