Senior Director for Security Policy
JINSA Report #: 1,099
June 14, 2011
http://www.jinsa.org/node/2333
Picking up where we left off, it seems the countries of the United Nations have begun to have second thoughts about trying to "create" a Palestinian state through the General Assembly, or - since the Palestinians declared their state independent in 1998 - accepting "Palestine" as a member of the UN without the imprimatur of the Security Council. Why now? We postulated that without the surety of a U.S. veto, they fear finding their own secessionist or irredentist movements - hundreds and hundreds of them - planning to bypass international norms as well to declare their independence.
But won't the United States veto the Palestinian demand for statehood? After all, President Obama has loudly said the UN was not the appropriate vehicle for establishing Palestine - negotiations with Israel are. Just last week, the President and German Chancellor Merkel stood together and reiterated the point. He called the Palestinians going to the UN a "mistake."
There is a difference between saying something is a bad idea and declaring that should they persevere, the United States will veto the Resolution. And there is a difference between taking a stand on principle and taking it only after trying every possible maneuver to avoid it and after trying to make Israel pay for it.
According to Eli Lake in The Washington Times, "A senior administration official Friday told American Jewish leaders that the request for Israel to endorse the president's peace principles was part of an effort to head off Palestinian plans to declare an independent state at the United Nations in September...'We have a month to see if we can work something out with the Israelis and Palestinians as accepting these principles as a basis for negotiations," [Steven Simon] said. "If that happens we are somewhat confident that the Palestinians will drop what they intend to do in the UN.'"
If the Administration opposes it, what difference does it make whether the Palestinians go forward or not? We can just veto it - and a serious threat of our veto should be enough to stop them. But this isn't the first time the Administration took an "if-then" position, or was diffident about Israel's position in the UN.
In May 2010, the United States joined the other 188 parties to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in singling out Israel for a conference to take place next year discussing banning weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East, changing the longstanding American determination that Israel not be singled out. Iran was not named in the Resolution.
The United States voted against the Goldstone Report in the General Assembly, but did nothing to support Israel, casting its single vote as one of 192 countries, not as a leader of others. Goldstone has since, of course, recanted much of the report that bears his name. (In a similar move, the United States voted for Canada to assume its traditional once-in-a-decade slot on the Security Council, but did not help Ottawa round up votes. When the Canadians lost to Portugal - a much less pro-Israel vote - the Administration said indignantly, "But we voted for it.")
In November 2010, the United States wanted Israel to extend its "settlement freeze," and among other inducements, promised to oppose a unilateral declaration of Palestinian independence. We asked at the time whether the U.S. opposition was principled, and, if it was, why it was necessary for Israel to "pay" for it.
In February, the Security Council wanted to declare Israeli houses east of the 1949 Armistice Line "illegal." The Administration did everything it could to find language for which it could vote but ultimately exercised the veto - while announcing in no uncertain terms that it really didn't like those houses either.
The Administration's maneuvering tacitly if not overtly encourages increased hostility from Israel's adversaries. It seems it may be making other countries nervous as well - if the United States can't be counted on to protect Israel, its democratic partner and ally in the Middle East, how can the United States be counted on to support their security requirements?
Maybe it can't.
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Re: The Price of the U.S. Veto in the Security Council
ReplyDeleteMs. Shoshana Bryen has surely zeroed in on a raw nerve the White House, the State Dept, et al, would all have preferred she stay away from when Ms. Bryen insightfully observes:
"The Administration's maneuvering tacitly if not overtly encourages increased hostility from Israel's adversaries. It seems it may be making other countries nervous as well - if the United States can't be counted on to protect Israel, its democratic partner and ally in the Middle East, how can the United States be counted on to support their security requirements?
"Maybe it can't".
How very important it is to contemplate this insightful point. And we may take the idea in other, additional directions as well.
The United States of America was always supposed to represent Democratic values and Freedom from Fear. Isn't that why America's Sons and Daughters shed so much of their precious blood on the beaches of Normandy and ten thousand other places in Europe, where so many fell in battle- never to return home.
How much longer can our nation expect to merit and even deserve, the respect of other nations if it continues to betray its original values which should be written as if in stone?
How long will America continue to waffle and vacillate, weave and dodge, avoiding the hard choices and the tough decisions.
Not only is this Administration's "maneuvering" tacitly encouraging Israel's adversaries but it is simultaneously weakening America's standing in the world as to whether America still stands for the values it has always espoused and raises the critical question of whether America has lost its backbone and its resolve to lead the "free world".
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ReplyDeleteSometimes too much talk just clouds all the key issues. Why can't the present Administration just cut to the chase and stick to the main talking points. There are really not so many.
There already was an attempt at a "two State" solution in 1947-1948. But the Arabs did not accept that two State solution. They wanted only one State- "their" State. No room for anyone else.
All the millions of words written in a dozen different languages, for one hundred years, will never alter that fact or wash away that last fact.
Is there anyone in the present White House who will ever have the plain old fashioned guts to point this fact out to the world without diluting the truth of it with double-talk, nauseating fawning and fanciful flights of self delusion and self contradictions.
Imagine for just a second if Israel had been the instigator of the war of 1948, if Israel had attempted to grab large swaths of land beyond the lines earmarked by the UN mandate--and then having lost the war and lost badly, started whining and complaining how Israel must be given a second chance. And that the Arabs must surrender all the land that Israel attempted to seize in the above described hypothetical, imaginary war, which is- of course- the very opposite of what happened from an historical standpoint.
When one puts on the glasses of Reality and sees things for what they really are, the whole Mid East discussion, as it now stands and is presented to the world, becomes distastefully laughable.
A higher form of life residing in some distant galaxy, observing the history of the Middle East, must find it all some type of fantastic, surrealistic journey into the realm of the absurd.
After over half a century, more than sixty three years after rejecting and refusing to accept what they were offered on a silver platter, without firing a shot, now after all the murderous wars to annihilate the Jewish people, Israel's enemies have the unmitigated chutzpah to be babbling on and on and on and on, about what they are "demanding" and claim they are entitled to.
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ReplyDeleteAfter over half a century, more than sixty three years after rejecting and refusing to accept what they were offered on a silver platter, without firing a shot, now after all the murderous wars to annihilate the Jewish people, Israel's enemies have the unmitigated chutzpah to be babbling on and on and on and on, about what they are "demanding" and claim they are entitled to.
Is there not a single person, a single Statesman or Stateswoman in the entire world, anywhere on this Earth who will state publicly, clearly, on the record, what I have just articulated here.
Or does everything really come down to a three letter word: "oil". Is that word, what has turned men and women into such cowards that they cannot muster up even the most watered down, evasive, cowardly statement that even merely begins to reflect on the truth of the sordid and very tragic history of a place called the Middle East.
Who can say if it really is true that sometimes a little "truth" is better and worth more than a big "lie".
Perhaps if someone, some candidate in the next Presidential election in America begins- when discussing the history of the Middle East-, to "tell it like it was and still is", people around this nation and around this world might just begin to wake up, take the cobwebs and the blinders off their eyes, and realize the Arabs have been pulling the wool over everyone's eyes for over half a century.
If they were not happy with a "two State" solution before, in the very beginning, how could anyone on this Earth ever be so naive and foolish as to think that it would reflect wisdom and or simple common sense, to believe anything the Arabs might say now- just to get what they want ?
Israel need only concern itself with one over-arching goal and that is to stay strong in every possible way.
It is good and admirable and even advisable to have friends and allies- in fact as many as possible. But the cold, hard truth of the matter, as our Tribe has learned time and time again, over many thousands of years, is that in the final analysis, we must not depend on anyone to come to our assistance, in time of peril and mortal danger, but ourselves.
And we must make certain that this will always be sufficient. As it has been in the past- so too it must be in the future.
G-d Bless Our Land- now and for all Eternity.
And may Israel- and the world- never forget the lessons of history. They came at a heartbreaking price.