Bush & the Palestinians

Yesterday, President Bush gave a gracious interview in the Oval Office to The Jerusalem Post and three other Israeli journalists. Today, the president embarks on a hectic farewell trip to the Middle East that will bring him to Israel tomorrow to celebrate the 60th anniversary of this nation's founding.

On Friday the president will head to Saudi Arabia to mark the 75th anniversary of the establishment of ties between Washington and Riyadh. And on Saturday, he will travel to Sharm e-Sheikh to meet Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Salaam Fayad, and Jordan's King Abdullah II. He is also scheduled to see the Afghan president, Iraqi leaders and Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora. Finally, Bush will participate in a World Economic Forum gathering before heading home.

Presidents come and go - figuratively as well as literally - but America's stance toward the Arab-Israel conflict remains remarkably consistent. Support for Israel is balanced against Washington's energy and strategic interests in the Arab world, tending to leave neither Israelis nor Arabs completely satisfied.

When Israel not only survived but captured vast amounts of territory in the 1967 Six Day War, America saw an opportunity to pursue a policy of "land for peace." Arguably, few Arab leaders can bring themselves to accept the legitimacy of Jewish sovereignty anywhere in the region. Nevertheless, land for peace has remained the unwavering American policy approach. The personalities, daily headlines and controversies change, but not America's fundamental direction. It is in this context that the pattern of Bush's decisions must be understood.

Recall that Yasser Arafat launched the Aksa intifada just months after Bush took office, even though Ehud Barak had offered him both land and statehood. Bush gave up on Arafat, refusing to ever meet with him, but stuck with the land-for-peace idea.

In the wake of the September 11, 2001, al-Qaida attacks on the US, Bush sought to garner support among Arab and Muslim pragmatists. Thus on June 24, 2002, he articulated his "vision" of a Palestinian state predicated on Palestinians electing reformist leaders. Bush sidelined Arafat and championed the more pragmatic, if ineffectual, Mahmoud Abbas.

Though the violence continued, in March 2003 Bush unveiled "a performance-based and goal-driven road map," to Palestinian statehood, calling for an immediate, unconditional cessation of Palestinian violence. But it also said, "As progress is made toward peace, settlement activity in the occupied territories must end." As Palestinian attacks went on to kill more than 1,000, Israel had little incentive to freeze Jewish life in Judea and Samaria. Still, repeated and unfulfilled promises to dismantle non-authorized settlement outposts continue to undermine Jerusalem's credibility.

Convinced that Abbas would not take risks for peace, Ariel Sharon proposed unilateral disengagement from Gaza and parts of the northern West Bank. Bush chose to interpret this as being in harmony with the road map. And on April 15, 2004, he wrote Sharon to say that in light of new realities it would be unrealistic for final-status negotiations to result in a withdrawal to the 1949 Armistice Lines.

Israel pulled out from Gaza in August 2005, giving the PA the perfect opportunity to create a nascent state. It was tragically squandered.

Hamas's victory in the Palestinian parliamentary elections held in January 2006 exacerbated an already volatile environment, and in June 2007 Abbas was ousted from Gaza. Today he hangs on in the West Bank due in no small measure to the IDF's presence.

No one can blame President Bush for not having ended the Arab-Israel conflict. And yet there are steps he could take to leave our region better off than when he took office.

He could unambiguously tell the relative moderates among the Palestinians that their demand for an Israeli withdrawal to the 1949 Armistice Lines is unrealistic; that their claims to a "right of return," which would spell the demographic destruction of Israel, should be abandoned; and he could press Abbas to use his Western-trained and -equipped forces to tackle the terrorist infrastructure right under his nose.

Finally, Bush could point out that no progress will be made until Abbas prepares his people for genuine reconciliation with Israel.

Bush in context

Of all the US presidents over the past 60 years, it is hard to think of a better friend to Israel than George W. Bush. No president has been more committed to steering the Middle East toward the values of liberty and tolerance which Americans naturally cherish, and presuppose to be universal.

Bush combines a personal affinity toward Israel with policies that are generally responsive to its concerns. His performance as president is best understood in historical context.
Harry S Truman courageously recognized Israel against State Department advice, but was personally prejudiced against Jews. Dwight Eisenhower rolled back Israel's 1956 Sinai Campaign victory and unintentionally solidified Nasser's hold on Egypt. John F. Kennedy pushed hard to keep Israel from developing an atom bomb.

Only Lyndon Johnson rises above his predecessors for opposing unilateral Israeli withdrawal after the 1967 Six Day War and establishing the "land for peace" principle which specified that the extent of Israeli concessions would have to be directly negotiated.

Richard Nixon was both personally prejudiced against Jews and the force behind the Rogers Plan that called for Israel's unilateral withdrawal to the 1949 Armistice Lines. His Machiavellian secretary of state has been accused of delaying arms shipments during the Yom Kippur War. And it was also under Nixon that secret contacts between the US and an unreformed PLO began.

When Israel balked at making strategic concessions in Sinai, Gerald Ford ordered a "total reassessment" of US policy toward Israel. Jimmy Carter's unsympathetic attitude to Israel is now widely understood, notwithstanding his having facilitated the Israel-Egypt peace treaty.
Like his predecessor, Ronald Reagan sold advanced weaponry to Saudi Arabia. He also stymied Israeli battlefield achievements in the 1982 Lebanon War. George H.W. Bush sought to make US loan guarantees for the absorption of Soviet Jews contingent on Israeli concessions at the negotiating table.

And a well-intentioned Bill Clinton helped broker the 1993 Oslo Accord, which inadvertently set the stage for the second intifada.

BUSH ARRIVES here today with a little over seven months left in his presidency. Though his policies in Iraq were paved with good intentions and Israelis are grateful that Saddam Hussein is dead and buried, we are left with the lingering sense, albeit informed by hindsight, that the Iraqi campaign was a strategic blunder of historic proportions. Meanwhile, the al-Qaida leaders who masterminded 9/11 remain free, and parts of Afghanistan are in turmoil. The "real and present danger" facing Western civilization, Iran, is unchecked.

It turns out that Saddam was not the greatest enemy of civilization; he did not have weapons of mass destruction and was not directly tied to 9/11. Yet, so far, America has lost over 4,000 troops; suffered tens of thousands of wounded and spent billions of dollars in treasure in an Iraq which shows little sign of coalescing. Consequently, it is today doubtful whether the American people have the political will (or the US military the wherewithal) to confront the Iranian menace.

STILL, WHILE Bush may have been wrong on Iraq, he is dead right about Iran - though an ungrateful, sometimes spiteful world appears in denial. Iran is blatantly pursuing destabilizing nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them beyond the Middle East, even as key international players stoke its economy.

Teheran exploits America's dilemma in Iraq by encouraging chaos in a manner beyond the ability of most Westerners to fathom. On the Palestinian front, the mullahs are championing Hamas with financing, weapons and training. Mahmoud Abbas can strike no workable deal with the Islamists looking over his shoulder. Hizbullah-occupied Lebanon is looking increasingly like an Iranian satellite.

The president told The Jerusalem Post yesterday that before leaving office he wants a structure in place for dealing with Iran. Washington already has a strong security commitment to Jerusalem. Now we would urge the president to work for an upgrade in Israel's relationship with NATO. Europe must understand that Iran is pivotal; that there will be no stability, no progress - not in Iraq, not in Lebanon and not on the Palestinian front - until Teheran's advances are first contained, and eventually rolled back.

Shmuel Katz, Zionist hero, dies at 93

Shmuel Katz, one of the last remaining links to the Zionist Revisionist icon, Ze'ev Jabotinsky, and himself a towering figure and a mighty pen of the Zionist Right, died in the early hours of Friday morning, soon after Yom Ha'atzmaut, at Tel Aviv's Ichilov Hospital. He was 93.

Well over a hundred people attended the funeral Sunday afternoon at the Hayarkon Cemetery in Petah Tikva.

Among the mourners were Likud Party chair and opposition leader Binyamin Netanyahu, former defense minister Moshe Arens, former MK Uzi Landau, former Knesset Speaker, MK Ruby Rivlin, Jabotinsky Institute director Yossi Achimeir and MK Gideon Sa`ar.

Katz was born in South Africa in 1914 and first came to Israel in 1936, joining the Irgun.
Jabotinsky sent him to London in 1939 to represent the Revisionist Zionist position. He soon found himself virtually stranded after Jabotinsky died suddenly in upstate New York in 1940. Katz subsequently made a living as a journalist working for a number of London newspapers while also founding a Zionist Revisionist weekly.

In 1946 he managed to return to Palestine and joined the Irgun High Command. He was the movement's de facto foreign minister and its last Jerusalem-area commander prior to statehood.

Katz was elected to the First Knesset on the Herut list. He is believed to have been the last surviving member of that First Knesset. A Knesset honor guard placed a wreathe on his grave.
Highly principled and often uncompromising, he quit politics and established a publishing house.
After the Six Day War he became a leader of the Land of Israel movement.

When the Likud Party won the 1977 elections and broke Labor's stranglehold on Israeli politics, Menachem Begin asked Katz to serve as his adviser on information, tasked with explaining the new government's position to a hostile media and an unfriendly Carter administration.

But Katz soon came to feel that Begin was too accommodating in the face of US pressure and in January 1978 left the premier over his peace negotiations with Egypt.

Katz opposed the notion of land for peace, championing the formula of peace for peace.
A prolific writer, essayist and historian, Katz had a regular column in The Jerusalem Post for many years and continued to publish occasional op-eds until very recently. Among his most important books are Lone Wolf: A Biography of Vladimir Jabotinsky; Battleground: Fact and Fantasy in Palestine; and The Aaronsohn Saga about the Nili spy ring, whose English edition was published late last year by Gefen.

Though a fierce ideologue, Katz was soft spoken, with a twinkle in his eye and a winning self-deprecating humor. As recently as several weeks ago, he was planning a new series of short op-eds for the Post in opposition to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's policies.

Katz is survived by his son Yuval who recited the kaddish memorial prayer and nephew Dr. Leonard Bliden who delivered a moving eulogy.

May his memory be for a blessing.

The Olmert scandal

Hizbullah and its allies have just pulled off what may well turn out to be a coup d'état in Lebanon. Large swathes of Beirut have fallen to the forces of Hassan Nasrallah and his Amal allies. Saudi Arabia and Egypt have called for an emergency meeting of the Arab League.
If Hizbullah's triumph is left unchecked by the mostly Sunni Arab world, non-Arab Iran will have moved a step closer toward regional hegemony.

There aren't too many dull news days in the Middle East. On Thursday, Yom Ha'atzma'ut, Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad let loose another hateful tirade, calling Israel a "stinking corpse" doomed to disappear. Latest intelligence assessments suggest Teheran could have nuclear weapons (and hard-to-overcome cruise missiles to deliver them) even sooner then originally feared.

Meantime, US President George W. Bush is scheduled to be here on Wednesday and Thursday to help Israel celebrate 60 years of independence, and also to push hard for a "shelf-agreement" between Jerusalem and an enfeebled Palestinian Authority. The next day, Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman is set to arrive to press the Olmert government to accept Hamas's offer for a Gaza cease-fire. Meanwhile, even as he facilitates the dismemberment of Lebanon, Syrian President Bashar Assad may be growing impatient over the Golan Heights.

CLEARLY, THIS is not a good time for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to be focused on anything but running the country, addressing a vital range of security, foreign policy and (let's not forget) domestic agenda issues. There is also the matter of his cancer that must be attended to.

But realistically speaking, how can he be paying complete attention to his job and his health while under multiple investigations by police and prosecutors? With a gag order over many key aspects of the latest inquiry now lifted, we know that the prime minister is suspected of taking hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash bribes over a period of years from Morris Talansky of New York.

At this point, police say they neither know the source nor the purpose of the money Talansky is said to have handed over.

Police will be interviewing the prime minister again this week in an investigation that is now expected to take, not days or weeks, but months to complete. The premier will no doubt worry whether his long-standing associate and former law partner, Uri Messer, is testifying against him. Olmert will be focused on whether what Talansky is telling the police is really as incriminating as media leaks suggest. He will certainly be anxious about how much longer his former bureau chief, Shula Zaken, can remain loyal in the face of repeated police interrogations.

Olmert insists he did nothing wrong and that when all the facts are known he will be vindicated. Late Thursday night he declared: "I am looking into the eyes of each and every one of you... I have never taken a bribe, I have never taken an agora into my own pocket. [But] if the attorney-general decides to indict me, I shall resign."

He insists that any money Talansky gave him went into his political campaigns or to other bona fide purposes. Plainly, in the back of everyone's mind is the dismal track record that police and prosecutors have established in the handling of previous investigations involving former president Moshe Katsav and ex-premiers Ehud Barak, Binyamin Netanyahu and Ariel Sharon.

GIVEN THE composition of his governing coalition and absent an indictment, Olmert may be able to hang on as prime minister even as the investigation continues. And it must be stressed that he is presumed innocent unless proven otherwise.

Nonetheless, the prime minister must be afforded the expedited opportunity to refute the latest charges, must utilize that opportunity, and must urge Uri Messer, Shula Zaken and anyone else involved to testify forthrightly as well. Saying that he will resign if indicted is simply not good enough because the insistent agenda of this country cannot be put on hold while Olmert and his key advisers are distracted.

Israel's governance is simply too challenging a burden for a leader preoccupied with facing down investigators in a complex financial scandal. If the prime minister cannot put this latest scandal to rest without delay, he must hand over the reins of power. The welfare of the country demands it.

The next 60 years

Israel is in a somber mood as we mark Remembrance Day for the nation's 22,437 fallen fighters. Also in our thoughts are the 1,634 men, women and children murdered by terrorists - most of them, paradoxically, since the 1993 Oslo Accord.

Last night we stood in homage, and we stand again this morning, as the wail of the siren sent out its piercing cry. For 24 hours Israel will be riveted by the narratives broadcast on television and radio about the lives cut short by war. Then, as darkness falls Wednesday night, Yom Ha'atzma'ut celebrations will commence.

The sudden emotional switch doesn't come easy, yet it reinforces the truth that freedom comes at a price.

This Independence Day finds some of us in a funk. The prime minister is under intense police scrutiny. Faith in the basic decency of the men and women who lead the nation has waned. The political system has been irresponsibly undermined by elected officials, judges, holy men and the media. Some in the national-religious community still feel alienated by the trauma of disengagement.

AND YET a degree of perspective is in order. From 70 CE, when most Jews were exiled, until 1948, when Jewish sovereignty was regained, this land remained at the epicenter of Jewish aspirations. Absent the collective dream of a return to Zion, the Jewish people would have long ago disappeared from history. And, by the grace of God, we have returned!

The process of state-building remains incomplete - but look how far we've come. The Jewish population in 1948 was 650,000; today it's 6 million. In its first 44 months, while practically bankrupt, Israel absorbed 700,000 Jews. In just 30 years, a million Jews from the former Soviet Union were absorbed. And in the past six years Nefesh B'Nefesh has brought 15,000 olim from affluent countries to Israel.

In 1948 there were two universities, today there are eight. Hebrew is now spoken by millions. In transportation, education, tourism, industry and public health, Israel's progress has been phenomenal. Per capita, our GDP places us in the top tier of nations.

Israel is now the world capital of Torah-learning, at the same time as it leads in hi-tech. We're even producing internationally award-winning cinema.

None of this is to minimize the challenges ahead. With the self-sacrificing founders gone, the way we choose tomorrow's leaders needs reforming. We're divided over how to define our Jewishness. Our non-Zionist, ultra-Orthodox rabbinical courts generate more dissonance than spirituality. They must be replaced by a system that joyfully promotes Judaism. The disparity between rich and poor must be narrowed. Israel's Arab citizens must share fully in the benefits and responsibilities of citizenship, national service included.

And plainly, the quality of our lives will not improve until we learn to treat each other with greater civility.

SIXTY YEARS on, Israel is a regional power, yet still not at peace with all its Arab neighbors. The fight against terrorism demands unrelenting vigilance. Sderot and other southern communities are under intermittent bombardment from the Gaza Strip.

Hizbullah beats the drums of war, while Bashar Assad's intentions remain enigmatic. The greatest strategic threat comes from the fanatical Iranian regime, which threatens to wipe Israel off the map even as it dementedly denies the Holocaust.

The Palestinians mark our achievement of sovereignty as their Nakba, or catastrophe. Mahmoud Abbas has yet to prepare his people for reconciliation.

Sixty years after the Palestinian Arabs first rejected a two-state solution, they appear little closer to accepting a compromise that most Israelis could live with. As Israeli officials speak of "considerable progress" in the post-Annapolis negotiations involving, perhaps, the uprooting of 60,000 Jews from Judea and Samaria and exit from parts of east Jerusalem, the Palestinians adhere to their demand for an Israeli pullback to the narrow boundaries of the 1949 Armistice Lines. They have not abandoned their demand for a "right of return," which would spell the demise of the Jewish state.

That the Jewish people have sovereignty and the chance to enjoy a civilizational renascence in this land after a millennium in exile is - quite literally - a miracle. May God shine His countenance upon us and navigate us safely through the next 60 years, and beyond.