Israel's Odysseus vs. the Sirens - by Yoram Ettinger

...Israel’s 1948 Odysseus, David Ben-Gurion, was enveloped by Israeli and American Sirens who attempted to trick him into postponing the establishment of the Jewish state and conceding land in the Negev, Galilee and Jerusalem. However, with a population of 650,000 Jews, a meager military, barely any economy, and less than a skeleton of international relations, Ben-Gurion stayed his course in defiance of immense Arab and international odds, which were assessed by the CIA as, potentially, "another Holocaust." Will the 2016 Israeli leadership -- benefiting from 6.7 million Jews, a powerful military force, a robust economy and an all-time-high global integration -- be seduced by the Sirens, or will it follow in footsteps of Ben-Gurion, embracing the Odysseus legacy?

Yoram Ettinger..
Israel Hayom..
10 June '16..
Link: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=16371

In 850 BCE, the legendary Greek author, Homer, introduced the mythical king of Ithaca, Odysseus, as a role model of leadership. Sailing home from the battlefield, Odysseus overcame sweeping temptations to dwell on wishful-thinking rather than reality. Odysseus overcame supreme seduction to stray from the proper course, and join the beautiful Sirens, who lured sailors with their seductively hypnotizing voices, music, and looks to shipwreck on the rocky coast of their island.

In 2016, the modern day Sirens of the Western media and policymaking try to divert (and confuse) Israel from the proper course of combatting terrorism, contending that "one's terrorist is someone else's freedom fighter"; that Palestinian terrorism is reaction to occupation; that Palestinian terrorists are "lone wolves" not institutional; and that Islam is a religion of peace, not terrorism.

However, contrary to freedom fighters, Palestinian terrorism -- a branch of the 1,400-year-old inherent Islamic terrorism -- has targeted Jewish and mostly Arab noncombatants (sometimes hitting combatants) deliberately, institutionally and systematically, as prescribed by the Quran, the Palestinian Charter and Palestinian hate-education in schools, mosques, and the media.

Moreover, Palestinian terrorism has plagued the Middle East since the 1930s -- before the 1948 establishment of Israel and the 1967 Six-Day War -- focusing on Israel's existence, not "occupation"; triggering civil wars, subversion and terrorism in Egypt in the 1950s, in Syria in the 1960s, in Lebanon (1970s and 1980s) and in Kuwait (1990); assisting Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and Syrian President Bashar Assad's repression of Iraq and Syria; and systematically siding with anti-U.S. and anti-Western rogue regimes, such as North Korea and Iran.

In 2016, Israel’s leadership is cajoled by modern-day Sirens from Israel, the U.S., Europe, and Arab countries to stray away from its national security course of navigation, which has been charted by costly geostrategic experience, security constraints and requirements, historical reality and commitments made to constituents.

A reality check might be in order concerning "The Palestinian Refugees" (part 2)

...Misinformation and disinformation have dominated the diplomatic discourse on the Palestinian issue, misleading Western policymakers and public opinion molders, thus radicalizing Arab expectations and demands, fueling terrorism and minimizing the prospects of peace.

Yoram Ettinger..
Israel Hayom..
29 December '13..

The Palestinian refugee issue has been dramatically misrepresented, distorting circumstances and numbers, in order to delegitimize the Jewish state.

The root cause then and now

According to the German Middle East expert, Fritz Grobba ("Men and Powers in the Orient"), the 1948 Palestinian leadership, headed by Grand Mufti Haj Amin Al-Husseini, wanted to apply Nazi methods to massacre Jews throughout the Middle East. In 1941, the mufti drafted a proposal requesting that Germany and Italy acknowledge the Arab right to settle "the Jewish problem" in Palestine and the Arab countries in accordance with national and racial Arab interests, similar to the practice employed to solve "the Jewish problem" in Germany and Italy. On Nov. 24, 1947, Acting Chairman of the (Palestinian) Arab Higher Committee Jamal Al-Husseini threatened: "Palestine shall be consumed with fire and blood," if the Jews get any part of it. On April 16, 1948, Jamal Husseini told the U.N. Security Council: "The representative of the Jewish Agency told us yesterday that they were not the attackers, that the Arabs had begun the fighting. We did not deny this. We told the whole world that we were going to fight."

On January 9, 2013, Mahmoud Abbas pledged allegiance to the Grand Mufti, who collaborated intimately with the Nazi leadership, particularly with Himmler, Hitler's most ruthless right hand man: "On the anniversary of Fatah, we renew the pledge to our fortunate martyrs. ... We pledge to continue on the path of the martyrs. ... Here we must remember the pioneers -- the grand mufti of Palestine, Haj Amin Al-Husseini."

Who is responsible?

PLO Chairman and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas admitted that "Arab armies forced Palestinians to leave their homes" (Filastin A-Thawra, March 1976). On May 13, 2008, Al Ayyam, the second largest pro-Abbas Palestinian daily, claimed: "[In 1948] the Arab Liberation Army (ALA) told Palestinians to leave their houses and villages, and return a few days later, so the ALA can fulfill its mission."

The head of Britain's Middle East Office in Cairo, John Troutbeck, reported in June 1949: "Arab refugees speak with utmost bitterness of Egypt and other Arab states. They know who their enemies are. Their Arab brothers persuaded them unnecessarily to leave their homes." Sir Alan Cunningham, the last British high commissioner in Palestine, wrote on April 28, 1948 that the total evacuation was urged on the Haifa Arabs from higher Arab quarters. The U.S. consul-general in Haifa telegraphed on April 25, 1948 that "reportedly, Arab Higher Committee is ordering all Arabs to leave."

The secretary-general of the Arab League, Azzam Pasha, told the Lebanese daily Al Hoda on June 8, 1951: "In 1948, we were assured that Palestine's occupation would be a military promenade. ... Brotherly advice to Arabs in Palestine was to leave their homes temporarily." The London Economist wrote on Oct. 2, 1948: "The most potent of the factors [triggering the Arab flight] were the announcements by the Higher Arab Executive, urging the Arabs to quit. ... It was clearly intimated that those Arabs who remained in Haifa and accepted Jewish protection would be regarded as renegades." Syrian Prime Minister Khaled al-Azam admitted in his 1973 memoirs that "we brought destruction upon the refugees, by calling on them to leave their homes."

According to the first U.S. ambassador to Israel, James G. McDonald ("My Mission in Israel"): "These Arabs ... fled from Palestine as the result of mass panic when the wealthy Arabs, almost to a man, began running away in Nov. 1947. ... The flight was provoked by lurid tales of Jewish sadism issued by the Mufti and his followers. ... Superstitious and uneducated, the Arab masses succumbed to the panic and fled. ... The refugees were on [Arab leaders'] hands as the result of a war, which they had begun and lost."

A reality check might be in order concerning "The Palestinian Refugees"

...Western policymakers and media who ignore reality, and embrace the claim of Palestinian dispossession, undermine the peace process and squander the Western taxpayers' resources.

Yoram Ettinger..
Israel Hayom..
13 December '13..

Western policymakers and media have misconstrued/misrepresented the Palestinian refugee issue, ignoring its global context and core data. Moreover, the Palestinian claim of dispossession -- which impacts the U.S. financial aid to UNRWA, and is defined as a key issue in the peace process -- fails the reality test.

The global context

At the end of 2012, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees documented 15.4 million refugees worldwide -- excluding Palestinian refugees who are administered by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency -- and 28.8 million internally displaced persons. Four million of the refugees are from Afghanistan. One of the results of the civil war in Sudan was 5.5 million refugees. Fifteen million refugees (Hindu, Muslim and Sikh) were created by the 1947 partition of India, which created Pakistan. The Greco-Turkish war of 1919-1922 involved a forced population exchange of two million people.

From 1990 to 1991, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait expelled 800,000 Yemenites and almost 300,000 Palestinians for collaborating with Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait. Some 300,000 Palestinians -- who were allies of Saddam Hussein -- fled Iraq following the first and second Gulf Wars. Since 1945, there have been some 100 million refugees worldwide, most of them resettled. On the other hand, Palestinian refugee camps in Arab territories have remained intact since 1950, while Palestinian leadership conducts a lavish life-style, including bank accounts stashed throughout the world.

Core data

According to an August 1971 Ford Foundation report, by 1950 the majority of the Palestinian refugees began evacuating the camps and non-refugees moved in to benefit from UNRWA's services. For example, half of the population in the Jalazone refugee camp, near Ramallah, settled there after 1950.

A November 17, 2003 report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office documented that less than 33% of registered Palestinian refugees live in refugee camps.

The actual number of Palestinian refugees is determined by the following: Before the 1948-1949 War of Independence, 800,000 Arabs (per inflated numbers) resided within the boundaries of "pre-1967 Israel." At the end of that war, 170,000 Arabs stayed in Israel. Of the remaining 630,000 Arabs, 100,000 were absorbed by Israel's family reunification gesture; 100,000 middle and upper class Arabs left before the beginning of the 1948-1949 war and were absorbed by neighboring Arab states; 50,000 migrant laborers returned to their Arab countries of origin; 50,000 Bedouins joined their brethren-tribes in Jordan and Sinai; and 10,000 were war fatalities. Thus, the actual total number of Palestinian refugees was 320,000. Most of the refugees followed their political, economic and social leadership, which left before the eruption of the war. Many were enticed to depart by Arab leaders, who promised a quick devastation of the Jewish state that would provide the evacuees with Jewish property. British authorities influenced others, pressuring the minority in mixed Jewish-Arab towns to evacuate: Arabs evacuated but Jews did not.

Realism on the Palestinians

Yoram Ettinger..
Israel Hayom..
21 September '12..

Governor Romney’s Sept. 18, 2012 assessments of the Palestinian issue — opposing the “two state solution” — highlight the battle between data-driven realism and desire-driven wishful thinking.

Data-driven realists are cognizant of the linkage between the increasingly anti-American seismic “Arab street’ on the one hand, and the nature of the proposed Palestinian state on the other hand. The more radicalized, unpredictable, violent, terrorist-ridden and anti-U.S. the “Arab street,” the more terror-oriented the proposed Palestinian state. The latter would be led by Palestinian organizations, which have been the role model of international terrorism since the 1960s. They were supporters of Bin Laden (whose mentor was a Palestinian — Abdullah Naji from Jenin), staunch allies of Saddam Hussein, Khomeini, the Soviet Union and the ruthless East European regimes. Their predecessors — e.g., Haj Amin Al Husseini — were Nazi Germany collaborators.

Track record-driven realists recognize the devastating impact of the proposed Palestinian state on vital U.S. economic and military interests. For instance, a Palestinian state would produce a tailwind for internal terrorism in Iraq, the Gulf and Jordan, providing training and indoctrination bases for international terrorists. It would add a feather to the cap of the Muslim Brotherhood (Mahmoud Abbas was expelled from Cairo in the 1950s due to his key role in the Palestinian cell of the Muslim Brotherhood). A Palestinian state would doom to oblivion the already shaky pro-U.S. Hashemite regime in Jordan, creating an anti-U.S. axis from Iran to Gaza. It would constitute a diplomatic, intelligence and operational military East Mediterranean anti-U.S. beachhead for North Korea, China, Iran and Russia (Russian-speaking Mahmoud Abbas has had intimate ties with Moscow since his graduation from KGB courses and his role as Arafat’s emissary to Communist capitals). A Palestinian state would add another anti-U.S. vote at the U.N., rewarding the Palestinian Authority, which has forced the flight of Christians from Bethlehem, Beit Jallah and Ramallah.

Experience-driven realists are aware of the linkage between the tectonic nature of the Middle East, in general, and Jordan, in particular, on the one hand, and the indispensability of the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria for Israel’s survival on the other hand. The more unstable, unpredictable, inconsonant and savage the Middle East, the higher the threshold of Israel’s security. The current predicament of the Hashemite regime could rapidly transform Jordan into an anti-U.S. radical arena, further intensifying the critical role of Judea and Samaria for Israel’s defense. The realists are aware of the demographic bogey, that Jewish demography surges, that Arab demography has been Westernized, and that the Jewish majority in the combined area of Judea, Samaria and pre-1967 Israel is solid, with the power to expand.

Rubin - Western Policy on Israel-Palestinian Peacemaking is Ludicrously, Totally Wrong and Will Produce Only Humiliating Failure

Barry Rubin
Rubin Reports
pajamasmedia.com
29 September '11

http://pajamasmedia.com/barryrubin/2011/09/29/western-policy-on-israel-palestinian-peacemaking-is-ludicrously-totally-wrong-and-will-produce-only-humiliating-failure/

It’s truly remarkable about how international diplomacy on the Middle East, especially Israel-Palestinian issues, is so out of touch with reality. Consider the Quartet’s response to the mess at the UN. The proposal is for Israel-PA talks to start within a month, both sides to present proposals on borders and security within three months, and to reach a final agreement by the end of 2012.

This is insane. The premise here is that the PA is really eager to negotiate a compromise agreement with Israel. Everything that’s happened in the past three years—indeed the last 18 years since the Oslo agreement was signed—shows the exact opposite. The PA spent a year building its campaign for unilateral independence at the UN precisely to avoid negotiating with Israel at all.

Why then create a Western policy that is not only doomed to fail but certain to fail in the most obvious and humiliating way? The Palestinians won’t negotiate in a month, they won’t rush to present any proposals in three, and they certainly won’t reach a peace treaty in a year. It looks like the PA will reject the whole proposal—a step for which they will pay no penalty but in fact will get more rewards and concessions, and thus will be encouraged to ignore the West even more.

The dumbest possible thing to do is to put a strict time limit on talks when your spoiled and rejectionist “client” doesn’t want to cooperate. The outcome will make the PA look very bad but “fortunately” the media and Western governments won’t point that out. Instead, the PA will run out the one-year deadline, then complain that Israel is at fault and doesn’t really want peace. and then urge speedy Western concessions to the PA and pressures on Israel.

Could anything possibly be more predictable? Perhaps the only possible explanation is that the U.S. government, UN, and EU (I doubt the Russians do so) believe their own propaganda. They really think the PA can’t wait to make a deal if only Israel is forced to negotiate and some more concessions are offer. Haven’t they learned anything?

Why Don't Western Elites and Governments Comprehend International Realities?

Barry Rubin
The Rubin Report
30 November 09

The question readers most often ask me is an extremely basic, vitally important one.

So how can we explain the world's second biggest problem today. The first is the flourishing of radical, often violent forces, committing aggression, making gains, increasing repression. The second is the refusal of all too much of the Western leadership and intelligentsia to notice that reality, then try to do something about it.

And so why does so much of the political and intellectual establishment in the United States and Europe fail to understand what's going on in the world? How do they not see that radical forces are enemies of their societies, not just misunderstood or mistreated potential friends? What prevents them from championing Western civilization's democratic, humanist, liberty-oriented, and free enterprise with reasonable government regulation system?

In short, why don’t they get it?

There are lots of answers, of course but even after one goes through the list the basic disconnect between reality, perception, and policy remains baffling. To see a society with such advantages and assets act as if it were intent on suicide, or at least with blind disregard for its survival, is a strange phenomenon. To view the stronger obsessed with making concessions, the more moral consumed with guilt, a blind inability to identify enemies who keep proclaiming their nature and intentions is just plain bizarre.

If I had to put it all in one sentence--admittedly a long, complex one--it would be this like this:

American and Western policymakers and intellectuals cannot believe or comprehend that so many would fight for bad causes out of ideological--nationalist, religious, traditionalist--worldviews, turning down material betterment in exchange for years of sacrifice, defeat, and suffering; engaging in a battle that a pragmatic assessment says they cannot win.

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