Kushner - From Israel: He Said No

Arlene Kushner..
01 July '12..





Former prime minister of Israel Yitzhak Shamir passed away yesterday at the age of 96.

Credit: Tributes.com 

A feisty man of few words who held on to his fiercely nationalist, Zionist convictions, he was noted for his integrity, his humility and his courage.

David Bedein, in a tribute to Shamir, recalls this from an interview:

"So I asked Shamir:

"How did you stand up to the pressure of the Reagan Plan of 1982 which demanded Israeli withdrawal to the 1967 lines, with only cosmetic changes?

"His answer: 'We Said No.'

"And how did you respond to the Schultz plan of 1987?

"His answer: 'We Said No.'

"And to the pressures from James Baker in 1991?

"His answer: 'We Said No.'

"And then, after a few more answers in this regard, he... said, very simply, that 'When we said no, they understood no'"

Lessons from the weekend protest you won't read about

Elder of Ziyon..
30 June '12..






Over the weekend, some 10,000 people protested over social issues in Tel Aviv. Unlike the violent protests the week before, where riots broke out and banks were broken into, this one was largely peaceful and as far as I can tell, no one was arrested

There was another, much smaller protest over the weekend that reveals a lot more about the Israeli/Arab conflict, however. And if it was covered at all by world media, it was barely a footnote.

(Read full "Lessons from the weekend protest you won't read about")

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From Israel: Beyond Stupid

Arlene Kushner..
21 June '12..





I don't know exactly how I should refer to the behavior of the six nations that are "negotiating" with Iran. But "stupid" doesn't quite cut it for me.

The two-day talks in Moscow, just completed, were an abysmal failure that went no where. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius referred to "the large gap between the two sides."

According to a report in Haaretz, "A Western diplomat who asked to remain anonymous said that one major obstacle revealed by the Moscow talks relates to the underground facility for uranium enrichment in Fordo, near the city of Qum. According to the diplomat, the Iranians refused to discuss the Fordo plant at all."

What does the international community imagine is going on there? And do they not know that there is reason to suspect that Iran may be operating covert enrichment sites as well?

But what did the six nations do? Consent to a low level technical meeting in early July, thereby allowing Iran more time to pursue their nuclear development. And if you think a couple of weeks won't matter, consider the report by the French news agency AFP yesterday, that US officials believe Iran will be able to produce enough fissile material for a nuclear weapon within four months,

Tobin - No Dissension Within Israeli Coalition on Iran

Jonathan S. Tobin..
Commentary/Contentions..
09 May '12..

With the dust settling from Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s brilliant political maneuver in which he vastly expanded his coalition and his power, the question remains what will he do with it in the next year? While Israelis seem more interested in domestic political implications of the move, not surprisingly, most foreign observers are focused on the impact of the new coalition on the issue of Iran’s nuclear threat. Some of Netanyahu’s frustrated critics are holding on to the hope that somehow the addition of Kadima head Shaul Mofaz will moderate the prime minister’s stand on the issue. But this is not only a misreading of Mofaz but of Netanyahu’s position.

As the prime minister demonstrated today in his meeting with European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, far from Mofaz’s entry into the Cabinet acting as a restraint on him, the creation of a government that can count on nearly 80 percent of the Knesset means that when Netanyahu speaks now there can be no doubt that he represents a strong consensus within his country on the issue. By bringing Mofaz as well as Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman to speak to Ashton, Netanyahu demonstrated that there is across-the-board support for his demands that Iran’s nuclear program be stopped dead in its tracks.

Ashton, a virulent critic of Israel who has been ceded control of the P5+1 talks with Iran by President Obama, may have intended her visit to Israel as an opportunity to mend fences so as to allow her to continue the diplomatic minuet she is dancing with the Islamist regime to continue unimpeded by Israeli actions. But Netanyahu used the meeting to lay down the guidelines for the upcoming negotiations in Baghdad. As Haaretz reported today:

Abrams - The Reconstitution of Likud

Elliott Abrams..
Pressure Points..
08 May '12..

On August 7, 2005, Israel’s Minister of Finance resigned his post in protest against Prime Minister Sharon’s plan to remove settlements and military bases from Gaza. That man was Benjamin Netanyahu. The Likud Party was split in two by the Sharon “Disengagement” plan, and Sharon quit Likud and formed the Kadima Party in November of that year. With him to Kadima came former Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, while Netanyahu stayed in Likud and became its leader once again.

Today Mofaz and Netanyahu, and more broadly Kadima and Likud, find themselves reunited in a coalition government. This reflects in part the weakness of Kadima: Mofaz recently won a primary against Tzipi Livni for party leadership, and polls showed that Kadima would slip very badly if an election were held, as had been planned, in the coming months. (The date had nearly been set for September 4.) For Mofaz that would be a disastrous start to his period of leadership, and for many Kadima members of the Knesset it would mean the end of their political careers. So Mofaz took Kadima into partnership with Likud, even though he did not receive either of the two major security portfolios: Minister of Defense or Foreign Minister. What did he receive?

Fresnozionism - Breaking News: Israel gets unity government

Fresnozionism.org..
08 May '12..






YNet reports:

No elections, Kadima joins government: In a dramatic move, the Likud and Kadima parties agreed on a unity government early Tuesday, averting the prospect of early elections.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Kadima Chairman Shaul Mofaz finalized the surprising unity agreement hours before the Knesset was expected to approve its own dissolution and set September 4th as the date of the next elections.

PM Netanyahu announced that Kadima’s Mofaz will be appointed deputy PM and minister without portfolio, while also being included in Israel’s security cabinet.

Shaul Mofaz, born in Tehran, came to Israel in 1957 and participated in all of Israel’s wars since 1967 (including the Entebbe raid). As chief of staff from 1998-2002 he was noted for the tough response to the Second Intifada, Operation Defensive Shield, in which Israel pacified Judea/Samaria. He recently defeated Tzipi Livni for the leadership of Kadima, the party which currently holds the largest number of seats in the Knesset (28), one more than Netanyahu’s Likud.

Eydar - Baseless historical comparisons

Dror Eydar
Israel Hayom
24 November '11

http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=893

Wednesday's speeches by Tzipi Livni and Shaul Mofaz in the Knesset accurately reflected the deterioration of the political debate in Israel. After we all read the article on Saturday about Israel being similar to the Weimar Republic in its final days, all hope is lost. What can you say to someone who believes that they live in an imaginary reality of baseless historical comparisons? This is total intellectual anarchy.

Mofaz used a well-known gimmick - George Orwell's "1984." Mofaz interspersed his brief speech with words taken from an alarming semantic pool: "dark regimes," "unenlightened," "thought police," "destructive," "dictatorship," "dangerous," "evil" and "monstrous."

The irony is that in "1984," Orwell actually lashed out against the European Left and the fulfillment of its political aspirations in the Soviet Union. So Israel is both a fascist dictatorship and a horrific Stalinist regime? What will they say tomorrow when they run out of comparisons and historical analogies? Ah, I remember, Mofaz also said we are a "pale version of the iron boot of China." Who writes his speeches? You have gone too far.

Meltzer - The End of Kadima

Yoel Meltzer
Towards A New Jewish Mindset
03 October '11


http://yoelmeltzer.com/the-end-of-kadima/

Following the election of Shelly Yachimovich as the new head of the Labor Party most polls show Kadima dropping significantly in the next elections. If so, one can only hope that this spells the beginning of the end for Kadima, a party that epitomizes many of the things that are wrong in Israel.

For starters its current leader Tzipi Livni has spent most of the last two and a half years doing nothing other than attacking Prime Minister Netanyahu. It doesn’t matter what the subject is or what the stakes are for Israel, Livni simply cannot show any public support for Netanyahu. However, for someone who aspires to be the head of the country, her unrelenting attacks, even during times when it is clear that her temporary backing would be for the good of the country, clearly demonstrates the irresponsible behavior of this party and its leader.

Even a few days ago when Netanyahu went to the UN to fight a diplomatic battle for Israel, Livni, rather than showing responsibility and closing ranks for the good of the country, couldn’t resist another opportunity to publicly flail Netanyahu and thus penned an article in which she blamed Netanyahu for Israel’s diplomatic isolation. She even contrasted Kadima’s “path of hope” to Netanyahu’s “path of despair…..that weakens and isolates Israel”. Never mind the usual inflexible position of Abbas and the Palestinians, the increasingly aggressive behavior of Turkey, the ongoing threat of extinction from Iran, the growing instability in Egypt, Syria and Jordan and the occasional terrorist or missile attack; in Livni’s dream world, if only Netanyahu was serious about peace everything would be fine.

Israel’s false friend

Melanie Phillips
The Jewish Chronicle
22 December 09

Five years ago, anti-Israel campaigners tried to arrest the then Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz for ‘war crimes’ while he was on a visit to London.

Since then, a steady stream of senior Israeli officials have either narrowly escaped similar arrest in Britain through diplomatic immunity, or have had to cancel planned visits because such an arrest was all too likely.

In all that time, the government has sat on its hands. Only now that Tzipi Livni has had to cancel her trip to London following an attempt to arrest her over her part in Operation Cast Lead has the British government said it will change the law, probably by making the Attorney-General the gatekeeper for any such arrest attempts.

Why is it only now that the balloon has gone up? One reason is that this is the first time the Israeli government has responded with unbridled fury at Britain. But also, for British diplomats, Livni is ‘one of us’. That is because, since she is one of the most appeasement-minded politicians Israel has ever produced, it is considered an affront to try to arrest her, of all people, for her part in warfare.

‘Livni supports a two-state solution. This attempt to secure her arrest has really set alarm bells ringing,’ a horrified senior Foreign Office source reportedly told the Guardian. The unpleasant implication is that the Foreign Office cares far less about attempts to arrest Israeli politicians with more hawkish views.

This telling remark shows how the Foreign Office circles the wagons when one of its ideological soul-mates is under attack — and is wholly unable to see how the amoral and unprincipled view of the world it believes it shares with Livni may actually be contributing to the problem.

(Read full post)
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Ha'aretz's Mualem Waters Down Mofaz Plan

Tamar Sternthal
CAMERA/Snapshots
16 November 09

A page three large font headline in Ha'aretz yesterday informs readers:

Mofaz supporters: Haaretz poll shows Israelis are willing to talk with Hamas

The article, by Mazal Mualem, begins:

A Haaretz poll showing 57 percent support for Kadima MK Shaul Mofaz's peace plan "proves the Israeli public is almost always a step ahead of its leadership," sources close to Mofaz said yesterday.

Mofaz's plan includes negotiations with Hamas and an interim Palestinian state on 60 percent of the West Bank in a year.

"The survey results speak for themselves, and here's proof for all to see the Israeli public isn't shocked or appalled by the idea of negotiating with Hamas," one Mofaz associate said.

Not once does the 11 paragraph article by Mualem note that Mofaz's proposal endorses dialogue with Hamas only if the group relinquishes terrorism and recognizes Israel, a fact pointed out in the second paragraph of Friday's front-page article by Yossi Verter, also in Ha'aretz.

Moreover, this would not be the first time a Dialog poll was cited to claim that a majority of Israelis support negotiations with Hamas. And it would not be the first time that poll results from Tami Steinmetz Center of Tel Aviv University contradict the Dialog results. The September 2009 Tami Steinmetz War and Peace Index states:

As to the question of whether Hamas can or cannot be a side to negotiations on a peace agreement with the Palestinians, a clear majority of the Jewish public (71%) says no, while a 53% majority of the Arab public says yes.