Dalai Lama in Israel

The welcome presence in Israel of Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama and leader of the Tibetan people, reminds Israelis that we are not, after all, at the center of the universe; that there are political struggles, philosophical approaches and spiritual roads that have nothing to do with Jews, Israel, or the clash between Islamist medievalism and Western modernity.

Faced with a newly installed and Hamas-led Palestinian parliament a stone’s throw from our capital and menacing taunts from a Teheran just over the ballistic horizon, we Israelis could, perhaps, be forgiven for focusing mostly on our own existential dilemma.

The Tibetan struggle is not for independence from China, but for cultural autonomy. A vast, mountainous territory almost six times Israel’s size, Tibet lies at the crossroads of India, Nepal and China.

It was briefly independent in 1911 as a Buddhist theocracy. But when a Tibetan uprising inside China spread to Tibet itself in 1956, Beijing began to reassert control over the region. By 1959 China had crushed the Buddhist rebellion and occupied Tibet, forcing the young Dalai Lama and tens of thousands of his followers to flee to refuge in India, where they now reside. Today, thanks to Chinese policies, Tibetans are a minority in their own land.

Jews know something about preserving a unique civilization in exile, and about facing down an enemy against overwhelming odds. And Israelis feel a special affinity to the Tibetan cause; some are helping to establish The Tibet Museum in India.

The mere presence of the cleric here (it was his third visit) made the Chinese Embassy in Tel Aviv uncomfortable. Consequently, neither Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert nor President Moshe Katsav met with the Dalai Lama. This sensitivity – though arguably diplomatically prudent – is misplaced given the disregard Beijing has shown for Israel’s concerns over Iran’s quest for nuclear weapons; not to mention the support that we, as a democracy and a Jewish state, should be showing for the cause of human rights.

Charismatic and self-effacing – followers believe he is the manifestation, or “reincarnate,” of the Buddha – the Dalai Lama won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989 for anchoring his cause in non-violence. He argues, pragmatically, that in politics reason must triumph over emotion; that there is a distinction between an evil act and the one who carries it out; that today’s enemy has the potential to be tomorrow’s friend.

“How do you dialogue with a Hitler or a Stalin?” an Israeli reporter asked.

Replied the sage after a lengthy pause: “It is difficult. But then violent methods are even more disastrous.”

Yesterday, speaking before a reverent audience at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the Dalai Lama instructed that compassion does not mean surrender; that the talmudic principle “What is hateful to you, do not to your fellow man” has parallels in all the great religions; and that at the end of the day, non-violence is the only way forward for humanity.

So beyond sympathizing with the decency of a man who abhors harm to his adversary, and the apparent justice of Tibet’s cause, what can Israelis take away from this encounter?

More ancient than Buddhism, the Judaic tradition is remarkably pragmatic. It places virtually no stricture above life itself. It is the civilization that aspires to the fulfillment of Isaiah’s vision that “Nation shall not lift up sword against nation; neither shall they learn war any more.”

Yet alluring as the Dalai Lama’s message is, his is not the Jewish way. Facing an enemy that invented the suicide bomber’s belt, the response of unilateral pacifism would result in our annihilation. In place of an imperfect Israel, a violently reactionary Islamist regime would arise.
Still, even though the message of non-violence resonates only as a faint hope vis-a-vis the Arab and Muslim world, perhaps the presence of this “simple Buddhist monk” will at least remind Israelis of the way we should treat each other.

No matter how acrimonious our schisms, no matter how profoundly felt the alienation or how painful the hurt after Gaza and Amona, we must abhor intra-communal violence. We must invoke the memory of another teacher of non-violence, the Rev. Martin Luther King, who, when urged by black militants in 1966 to abandon his peaceful path, brushed them off, declaring: “I’m not going to use violence, no matter who says it.”

Thank you Amira Hass

Were you as intrigued as I was by Amira Hass’s piece on Haaretz’s front page today (Sunday, February 12)?

It’s an item that ought to be read – carefully.

Hass – perhaps the country’s foremost pro-Palestinian, Israeli-born journalist – describes a closed-door meeting of the Quartet (the UN, US, EU & Russia) which took place on January 30 in London.

Also attending was former US president Jimmy Carter, in his capacity as having been a “senior” monitor of the Palestinian elections.

A quick aside. Years ago, I interviewed the late Rabbi Alexander Schindler in connection with research I was doing on his tenure as chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations during the Carter years.

Schindler, a Reform rabbi and liberal Democrat, told me in no uncertain terms that Carter was the only president he would classify as an out-and-out Jew-hater. I’ve never forgotten that.

Back to London.

Carter used his Quartet guest appearance, according to Hass, to denounce Israeli policies and to criticize the US for coddling the Jewish state.

Then Carter urged the Quartet to open negotiations with Hamas. Hass does not tell us how Condoleezza Rice reacted.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavorov, Hass reports, also said a few nice words about Hamas.

One thing that emerges out of Hass’s description of the meeting is that the Quartet was (all along) far from united in backing Washington’s “no talk” stance on Hamas. Not just Russia, but Kofi Annan and the EU’s Javier Solana also wanted to go soft on Hamas.

What this illuminates for me is that all the anger at Putin because of his plans to invite Hamas to Moscow is wasted.

Pundits were asking why Russia was “breaking” with the Quartet, and speculating that Moscow wanted to re-establish the foothold in the region that the USSR once enjoyed. There’s something to that, perhaps.

But if Hass is right – Russia’s actions are in essential harmony with the Quartet’s view of Hamas.

If anyone is out of step with the “international community” it is Washington.

The Prophet’s honor

The cartoon was disgracefully insensitive. It depicted a barbed wire Star of David in which innocent Palestinian men, women and children were trapped. By the time it appeared in the "Seattle Times" in July 2003, hundreds of Israeli civilians had been mercilessly slaughtered by Palestinian terrorists in what they call the “second intifada.”

But compared to what is typically found in the Arab press, cartoonist Tony Auth’s effrontery was fairly bland.

Arab political “humor” knows no bounds.

A cartoon in Qatar’s Al-Watan depicted Prime Minister Ariel Sharon drinking from a goblet of Palestinian children’s blood. Another, in the Egyptian Al-Ahram al-Arabi showed him jackbooted, bloody-handed and crushing peace.

Arab cartoonists routinely demonize Jews as global conspirators, corrupters of society and blood-suckers. Just this Saturday, Britain’s Muslim Weekly published a caricature of a hooked-nose Jew – Ehud Olmert.

And it’s not just cartoons. During Ramadan 2002, an Egyptian satellite television channel broadcasted the multi-episode "Horseman Without a Horse" series based on the Protocols of the Elders of Zion canard.

How did Israel and world Jewry respond? The Israeli embassy in Cairo filed a protest. A US student group held an orderly demonstration outside an Egyptian consulate, and Jewish leaders sent a strongly-worded letter to the Mubarak government.

Contrast this with the frenzied Muslim reaction to 12 cartoons, including one depicting the Prophet Muhammad wearing a bomb-shaped turban which appeared in the Danish newspaper Jyllands Posten five months ago and was recently widely disseminated. It was intended, paradoxically, to satirize Muslim intolerance.

The cartoon “blasphemy” has generated bomb threats, armed takeovers and widespread desecration of the Danish flag. A Western cultural center was vandalized; Catholic aid workers were threatened. European observers at the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Sinai wisely stayed away from their posts.

Several Muslim states have recalled their ambassadors. There is talk of a Muslim trade boycott of Danish (and European) products. Mass protests are being held throughout the world. In London, marchers carried placards reading: “Massacre those who insult Islam” and “Freedom go to hell.” Protesters denounced the BBC for airing the cartoons during news broadcasts.

Things continue to deteriorate. In Damascus on Saturday rioters set fire to the building that houses the Norwegian, Danish and Swedish embassies. In Beirut yesterday the Danish embassy was set ablaze.

Official Western reaction has generally been to meet intolerance with remarkable sensitivity and understanding. Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen, while apologizing for the offense caused, sought to explain that his government doesn’t actually control what newspapers publish.

The Vatican condemned the cartoons as offensive; so did the US State Department (though the White House denounced subsequent anti-Western violence as “outrageous”).
British Foreign Minister Jack Straw counseled self-censorship: “There is freedom of speech... but... not any obligation to insult or to be gratuitously inflammatory.”

There are those who would argue that the controversy does not reflect a clash of civilizations. Yet it is precisely this persistent refusal to acknowledge the obvious that weakens the cause of tolerance and liberty. Must “understanding” invariably result in the abdication of Western values?

If anyone wants to appreciate why the West views with such suspicion the weapons programs of Muslim states such as Iran, they need look no further than the intolerance Muslim regimes exhibit to these cartoons, and what this portends.

No one wants to add fuel to the fire. Mobs are more easily placated than reasoned with. But once this controversy passes it will be valuable to determine just who exploited the flap to foment anti-Western outrage, and to inquire what “moderate” Muslim voices said.

One such voice, Jihad al-Momani, editor-in-chief of the Jordanian weekly Shihan, was arrested for republishing the cartoons (to show Arabs what they were protesting). In an accompanying editorial – which his staff subsequently repudiated – Momani wrote: “Who offends Islam more? A foreigner who draws the prophet... or a Muslim with an explosive belt who commits suicide in Amman or anywhere else?”

Globalism demands that points of contact between Islam and the West be multi-cultural havens, not flashpoints. For that to happen, tolerance must be a two-way street.

Angela Merkel in Jerusalem – The EU says it won’t deal with Hamas. Germany must make sure it really doesn’t

You’d have to figure, as I do, that God has an arch sense of humor to appreciate why the first foreign leader scheduled to visit Jerusalem and Ramallah in the wake of Hamas’s electoral victory is German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Personally, I’d advise Merkel to eschew Ramallah altogether – too many bad-tempered gunmen running around. But it is reassuring to know that, if she does go, she will limit herself to meeting PA President Mahmoud Abbas and his dwindling Fatah coterie. The chancellor is championing the European Union’s stance, which precludes negotiating with the soon-to-be-installed Islamic Resistance Movement government.

To break the boycott, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana says Hamas must recognize Israel’s right to exist. French President Jacques Chirac pledges his country won’t talk to Hamas until it issues a public renunciation of violence, recognizes Israel’s right to live in peace, and commits itself to the agreements the PA has already signed. And Prime Minister Tony Blair’s government tells Hamas it has to “decide between a path of democracy or a path of violence.”


SO, ON the face of it, we have a principled Europe saying all the right things. But Germany, Britain and France – the Europe that matters most – will be faced with an enormous temptation to allow realpolitik to guide their relations with Hamas.

Some in Europe will move to sanitize Hamas. A non-violent “political” wing will be discovered. And the Islamists will facilitate matters by keeping Abbas around as president and appointing someone like former PA finance minister Salam Fayyad as a figurehead premier. This would allow Europe to maintain support for the PA while nominally refusing to deal directly with Hamas.
Europeans could tell themselves that Hamas’s capture of 74 seats to Fatah’s 45 was a yes for “Change and Reform,” not suicide bombings. And they’re getting the ammunition to do it.

In Newsweek Palestinian pollster Khalil Shikaki argues that “Hamas received only 45 percent of the popular vote.” It was a vote, claims Shikaki, against Fatah corruption. And anyway, exit polls showed “three-quarters of all Palestinians, including more than 60 percent of Hamas supporters,” favoring a two-state solution.

So there you have it: Why should a majority of Palestinians be penalized for the actions of a minority?

You can just hear the Europeans – who are the PA’s biggest donors – flagellating themselves: What about the PA’s $69 million budget deficit this month alone; or its anticipated $600m. deficit for 2006? At last week’s World Economic Forum in Davos, James Wolfensohn, the Quartet’s special envoy, warned that “The Palestinians are basically bankrupt.”

And PA Minister of Economy Mazen Sinokrot, also at Davos, whinged, “We have to pay salaries. Where will this money come from?” Sinokrot went on to note that the PA’s 135,000 employees, including 58,000 gunmen, were the “breadwinners” for 30 percent of Palestinian families. “If these salaries do not come in, this is a message for violence.” Hint, hint.

Most of the PA’s “revenues” – something in the neighborhood of $1 billion – go to what is euphemistically called salaries. And, anyway, the Europeans may persuade themselves, if we don’t do it, the Hamas-led PA will turn to Iran and Saudi Arabia – and then where would EU taxpayers be?

Richer, I suppose.


ENTER ANGELA Merkel, who arrived yesterday for a 24-hour visit. In a world where nations have no permanent friends, only permanent interests, the German-Israel connection is unique.
Germany’s Overseas Development Minister, Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul, said Germany would carefully watch Hamas’s behavior: “That is what will decide whether we continue our aid for the people in the Palestinian territories.” But Merkel’s foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, seemed to want it both ways, telling Der Spiegel that Berlin “accepted” the outcome of the Palestinians’ free elections, but adding that “Hamas must give up violence and recognize Israel’s right to exist. Terrorism and democracy do not match.”

Then he hedged his bets. “Votes for Hamas were not votes against peace or for a religious or ideological radicalization, but for reforms in Palestine. We must respect this wish.”

The German press is also hedging. The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung commented: “The way the West, Europeans and Americans respond to this development will be an important factor in determining how seriously Muslims take the demands for democratization....”

And Andrea Nüsse, writing in yesterday’s Tagesspiegel, opined that maybe “the pragmatic wing” of Hamas would become ascendant. The Die Linke Party, mostly former East German communists, advocated a softer approach, arguing that weakening the PA would only worsen the situation.

Berlin-based journalist Daniel Dagan reminded me that Merkel arrived here on the heels of last Friday’s official commemoration marking 61 years since the liberation of Auschwitz. There is no way around it: There will always be a special poignancy when a German leader visits Yad Vashem, which Merkel is scheduled to do this morning.

For Dagan, a keen observer of German-Israel relations, Merkel’s visit is a welcome signal after five years in which the previous chancellor demonstratively avoided coming to Jerusalem.
A German friend, Anna Held, who works at Berlin’s Goethe Institute, told me the reaction to the Islamist win among German opinion-makers was one of shock. “Everyone here opposes dealing with Hamas until it acknowledges Israel’s right to exist,” she said. “But opinions vary as to how to achieve that end.”


BERLIN DOES not usually like to take the lead in European foreign policy. It prefers to help shape an EU consensus. But there is no escaping the pivotal role Germany must now play. With Israel threatened by the prospect of an implacable, nuclear-armed Teheran on the one hand, and a uncompromising Islamist regime in Ramallah on the other, Israelis turn not to London or Paris but, paradoxically, to Berlin.

Merkel became chancellor last November and, to everyone’s surprise, has become remarkably popular. In her first speech to the Bundestag she proclaimed: “Dialogue with Islam carries great significance – we have to learn to understand each other. We will do this in an open and honest way. We will not brush aside differences, but name them clearly.”

It was Merkel who first accused Iran of having crossed a “red line” in its genocidal talk against Israel.

Today, in London the EU, Russia, the United Nations and the United States are scheduled to meet to coordinate European policy toward Hamas (a separate meeting, also today, grapples with Iran’s nuclear program).

What, realistically, can Israelis expect from Merkel? The answer: to help craft a European policy that exploits what is, among other things, an extraordinary opportunity.

Merkel’s no-nonsense leadership is especially needed to ensure that the EU’s enunciated criteria for dealing with Hamas does not get watered down.

Europe must insists that Hamas explicitly recognize the right of a sovereign Jewish state to exist in peace. If Hamas says that it can’t or won’t, Europe must diplomatically and financially isolate the PA’s Islamist leadership.

The one thing that should not happen is for Europe to allow Hamas to proclaim a truce while facilitating the “bad terrorists” of the Aksa Martyrs Brigades and Islamic Jihad to continue “resistance operations.” We already went down that road with Yasser Arafat.

The new PA must do what the old PA didn’t: live up to its road map commitments.

Perhaps fate intended for the straight-talking Merkel to be on the scene ensuring that neither her EU allies nor Hamas proclaim one policy while adhering to another.