He ain't mad...

Got busy Tuesday & didn't get around to posting this...

Pyongyang lesson


Say that in response to North Korea's detonation on Monday of a Nagasaki-like nuclear blast, the world declares: "Enough is enough."

China, the North's only ally, cuts off fuel and seals its border. South Korea halts humanitarian aid. NATO warships, backed by Russia's Pacific fleet, enforce a total blockade.

How might North Korea react? Perhaps by invading the South; perhaps by exploding a nuke over Seoul. Or perhaps the regime would begin to gasp its last, as millions of starving northerners stormed the Chinese and South Korean borders.

The sudden, forced reunification of the peninsula would saddle the modern, affluent South with incredible logistical problems - foremost among them how to feed a backward, impoverished population and integrate it into their hyper-modern society.

In other words: At this late stage, decision-makers are likely to find meaningful action totally unpalatable.

IT HAS no doubt been instructive for Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to observe the civilized world's reaction, over the years, to North Korean provocations.

After revving up their nuclear program around the time of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the North Koreans conducted an underground nuclear test on October 9, 2006. Following an outcry, they pretended to abandon their program and duly obtained a range of economic and diplomatic payoffs. In October 2008, the Bush administration removed North Korea from the State Department's list of countries which sponsor terrorism.

Western intelligence analysts think the 2006 test, which registered with the magnitude of a 4.2 earthquake, may have been a dud. As David E. Sanger of The New York Times writes in The Inheritance, "The yield was below a kiloton, far less than a tenth of the power of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima."

Not so yesterday's blast, estimated at 4.5 to 5.3 magnitude.

North Korea is a hereditary dictatorship led by Kim Jong-Il, who followed his father, Kim Il-Sung. He will likely be replaced by his son Kim Jong-Un.

The masses suffer unspeakable deprivation - during the 1990s hundreds of thousands died of famine and disease - while resources are directed to the military-industrial complex and propaganda. A cloying personality cult has transformed the leader into a deity, while xenophobia and racial supremacy lead people to fear change.

North Korea purchased centrifuges and, possibly, uranium from Pakistan. It raises money by selling what it knows about building missiles and atom bombs. For 10 years - under the nose of American intelligence - it built Syria's al-Kimbar nuclear facility in the Euphrates Valley, a mirror image, writes the Times' Sanger, of the North's own Yongbyon reactor.

As the Bush administration was obsessing over Saddam Hussein's non-existent nuclear weapons, North Korea was preparing to transform next-door Syria into a nuclear power. Mercifully, on September 6, 2007, the nearly completed reactor was smashed by the Israel Air Force before it could be fueled.

Pyongyang and Teheran share their nuclear know-how. Iranian scientists were reportedly present at the October 2006 detonation and, we assume, observed Monday's blast too. By learning from the North Koreans, the mullahs may be laying the groundwork - literally - for an underground nuclear explosion of their own.

KHAMENEI knows that while the West spins its wheels, Iran's quest for nuclear arms proceeds apace. "Fate changes no man, unless he changes fate," he's fond of telling acolytes. And yet, he can't afford to be sanguine.

True, Iran's nuclear sites are scattered throughout his vast territory, providing redundancy and concealment from attack. True, too, complex problems such as fuel-making, bomb-building and weapons delivery are being successfully addressed.

Still, the ayatollah worries. It's not inconceivable - even at this late stage - that he could be forced to freeze Iran's program. What if the new American president runs out of patience, sooner rather than later? What if Barack Obama convinces Europe, Russia and China that the world can't afford another North Korea on top of an unraveling nuclear Pakistan? Certainly not one whose imperial ambitions are fueled by high-octane religious extremism.

Realistically, Khamenei reassures himself that the prospects of crippling sanctions don't figure even remotely on the international agenda. Still, he will sleep a lot more soundly once stopping Iran becomes as unthinkable as trying to roll back nuclear-armed North Korea.

We have a suspect

A patient enemy


One solitary Arab country has never been under absolute Muslim hegemony: multi-ethnic, multi-cultural and religiously heterogeneous Lebanon. For this, it has paid a price - even before Persian Shi'ite radicals took power in Teheran in 1979 and set up Hizbullah in 1982.

In 1958, for instance, Sunni nationalists tried to force the country into the pan-Arab orbit under Egypt's Abdul Gamal Nasser. The Christians, then less fragmented, more numerous and wielding clout, said no and were backed by president Dwight Eisenhower.

By 1975, civil war had pitted Muslims against Christians, drawing in the PLO, Syria and Israel; it lasted into the 1990s.

Only two months ago, Damascus opened an embassy in Beirut, which suggests it may have abandoned the claim that Lebanon is part of Greater Syria.

Israel, needing to defend its northern border - first against Palestinian incursions, more recently against Hizbullah - has repeatedly been drawn into the quagmire.

This is the context for Lebanon's election campaign, which culminates on June 7. It is being waged in 26 districts for 128 parliamentary seats. Iran's proxies are led by Hizbullah (fielding only 11 candidates) and include Nabih Berri's (Shi'ite) Amal and Michel Aoun's (Christian Maronite) Free Patriotic Movement. They're competing against the Sunni-led "March 14 coalition" backed by Saudi Arabia and headed by Sa'ad Hariri. Other members include the mercurial Druse leader Walid Jumblatt and former Phalangist chieftain Samir Geagea.

The election is "free," but not cheap. One voter told The New York Times: "Whoever pays the most will get my vote. I won't accept less than $800."

It costs money to pay your opponent to drop out, to purchase positive news coverage, and to fly in expatriates. To help citizens remember to whom they owe allegiance, the parties helpfully provide them with prepared ballot slips.

TWO BIG news stories frame the lead-up to the voting. Hizbullah and its allies say they've uncovered a spy ring working for Israel (21 local suspects arrested, several others reportedly having fled to Israel). The disclosures, Hassan Nasrallah declared in a campaign message, prove that his movement can best face down "the Zionist enemy."

The other big story, revealed over the weekend in Germany's Der Spiegel, is the surprise revelation that an independent (partly UN-funded) tribunal investigating the February 14, 2005, assassination of Rafik Hariri will lay the blame at Hizbullah's - not Syria's - doorstep. German investigators will reportedly name as the mastermind Hajj Salim, Imad Mughniyeh's replacement, who reports directly to Nasrallah and Gen. Kassim Sulaimani in Iran. Hariri was murdered, Der Spiegel speculates, because Nasrallah felt threatened by the Sunni billionaire's broad-based popularity. Hizbullah claimed the story was intended to divert attention from the Israeli "spy networks."

Even the rosiest election result scenario - a slight gain for the anti-Iranian bloc - would not fundamentally shift Lebanon's alignment of forces. The prime minister, as always, will be a Sunni, the president a Christian and the parliament speaker a Shi'ite. Sorry to say, Hizbullah will remain the dominant social, political and economic movement - regardless of how many seats its partisans capture. It has the guns, the cash and the backing of a ruthless regional power. It seeks to change the constitution and ultimately capture de-jure control of the country.

It's hard to see how US Vice President Joe Biden's Friday visit to Beirut, coming on the heels of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's trip last month and aimed at tacitly bolstering the relative moderates, did much good. The last thing the "moderates" need is to be publicly embraced by Washington. They know that the West has been loath to confront Hizbullah or its patron, and that's what matters.

In February 2005, in the wake of the Hariri murder, tens of thousands of Lebanese demonstrated in the streets, eventually forcing Syria to withdraw its troops from the country. There was a fleeting sense that, just maybe, the forces of extremism had been routed. But the following month, Hizbullah massed far greater numbers, dashing hopes that popular sentiment alone could overcome the Iran-Hizbullah behemoth.

Rather than going for an overt power grab, Hizbullah is slowly metastasizing deep inside Lebanon's body politic. The process offers a sobering glimpse into Iran's regional modus operandi and its patient imperial designs.

Thank God it's Friday

The week that was

An FBI sting operation led to Wednesday's arrest of four Muslims in New York City charged with plotting to blow up the (Orthodox) Riverdale Jewish Center and the (Reform) Riverdale Temple in the Bronx. Lev Dassin, acting US attorney for the Southern District of New York, said the men had "selected targets and sought the weapons necessary to carry out their plans."

Besides the uncovering of the Riverdale plot, this week brought some other good tidings for which we are grateful: The Obama administration decided to fund the entire Arrow-3 anti-missile program now in development; US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told Al Jazeera that there would be no European-like flirtation with Hamas by Washington, saying: "Hamas has to comply with not only the Quartet principles but the underlying principles of the Arab Peace Initiative." Finally, the president made it clear that his efforts to dissuade Iran from building nuclear weapons would not carry on beyond the year; and that - as he told Newsweek - all options were on the table.

YET there's no papering over the differences that emerged this week in the wake of Binyamin Netanyahu's meeting with Barack Obama.

The president supposes Israeli concessions on the Palestinian track can help stop the Iranian bomb. The reality: With the mullahs' power ascendant, Hamas and radical Fatah factions have no reason to moderate their line. Obama wants a complete settlement freeze, West Bank checkpoints lifted, outposts removed, and the criteria regarding what passes into Gaza loosened.

Yesterday's dismantling of Maoz Esther, near Kochav Hashahar -- a non-authorized outpost reportedly built on private land -- belatedly begins to addresses the outpost issue. And Netanyahu is committed to not creating new settlements. But mainstream Israel will not tolerate a "settlement freeze" in metropolitan Jerusalem.

Personally speaking, I don't want to see a freeze in the settlement blocs either. In fact, so long as the state invites people to live over the Green Line, I don't know how we can expect them -- no matter which community they live in -- to freeze their lives. What if there is a need to expand an apartment or home because of a new baby?

The elimination of more checkpoints - a life-and-death decision - needs cautious handling, as does the question of what passes into Gaza.

It was no secret that the administration was working on a peace plan. But it is unsettling that more of it was leaked to the London-based Al-Quds Al-Arabi than, apparently, was revealed to Netanyahu.

And yet the details, if accurate, break little new ground. Obama reportedly wants a Palestinian state alongside Israel and stresses it must be demilitarized - something George W. Bush failed to emphasize. He tells the Palestinians to abandon demands for the "right of return." The fate of Jerusalem, he says, must be decided by the parties (though the holy basin should be placed under UN stewardship). He reportedly calls for land swaps to compensate the Palestinians for settlement blocs, thus implicitly embracing the "1967-plus" letter Bush gave Ariel Sharon in 2004. He's also pressing moderate Arabs to push the Palestinians to be more compromising.

In that Al Jazeera interview, Clinton was asked whether the settlement freeze meant Obama wanted to roll Israel back to the 1949 Armistice lines. Her answer: "First, we want to see a stop to settlement construction, additions, natural growth - any kind of settlement activity. That is what the president has called for. We also are going to be pushing for a two-state solution which, by its very name, implies borders that have to be agreed to…"

We read that as a "no."

It is unlikely in the extreme that the PLO will accept Obama's blueprint, despite the moderate-sounding tone lately adopted by Nabil Abu Rudaineh, Mahmoud Abbas's spokesman. Fatah is horribly fragmented: The old guard doesn't want to loosen its grip on power. Its pragmatists and hard-liners are arguing over how to negotiate with Israel. And the younger generation wants to officially reverse Fatah's commitment to end terror if Israel doesn't capitulate to its demands.

Meanwhile Hamas, ever more popular, bides its time, waiting for the West to reconstruct Gaza for it.

RATHER than get into a huff over Obama's demands, which are basically in harmony with the policies of his predecessors, Israel needs to ensure that it does not allow itself to be depicted as the obstacle to peace.

The good news is that Netanyahu is making a beginning at stressing what we are for - letting the Palestinians rule themselves. And by trying to get the Palestinians to acknowledge Israel's legitimacy as a Jewish state, he is correctly addressing the root cause of the conflict.

Two short comments

Jerusalem Day


Friday marks 42 years on the Hebrew calendar since Jerusalem was reunified; Jews never abandoned the hope of returning following their expulsion in 70 AD. Between 1948 and 1967, Jordanian snipers transformed the streets near the Old City into a no-man's land. Jews were barred from reaching such iconic sites as the Temple Mount and the Western Wall.

It's simplistic to talk about Jerusalem in catch-phrases. The city is neither as "united" as Zionists would want, or as "de-facto divided" as Arab propagandists claim. It's also a misnomer to talk about "east" and "west" in describing a city whose neighborhoods intersect around hills and over valleys.

Walk Jerusalem's streets and you'll quickly understand why the city can never again be physically divided - though it can, potentially, be peacefully shared.

Metropolitan Jerusalem - population 760,800 - is 65 percent Jewish and 35% Arab. Sadly, most Arab families, and a good many Jewish ones, live in poverty. Only 45% of Jerusalemites are in the labor force (Arab women and haredi men tend not to work). Most Jewish pupils attend haredi schools. There's a classroom shortage in Arab neighborhoods.

The population is, socially and religiously, old school; at the same time, the city brims with spiritual pluralism, culture, art, even fine dinning.

Mayor Nir Barkat promises better services for the Arab sector (which boycotts the municipal council and is thus voiceless regarding how tax money is spent). He has also undertaken to make the city more inviting for non-haredi Jews.

In short, living here is intense… it's not easy, but it is a privilege.

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Funding conversion


Israel is a Jewish state. Yet, paradoxically, all too many of its native-born Jewish citizens are alienated from their heritage.

The state's founders were mostly irreligious - though Jewishly literate, capable of navigating their way through the liturgy and expounding the Torah. Oddly enough, they took it for granted that subsequent generations would be equally learned, adhering to a secular worldview while grounded in the Jewish canon.

So they relegated Judaism to an Orthodox rabbinate, which became the "established church." Sadly, however, in the minds of countless Jewish Israelis, honoring their tradition become entangled with Orthodox nitpicking and coercion.

Add to this mix the arrival of 300,000 immigrants from the former Soviet Union who are not halachically Jewish.

Among them are those who wish to affiliate with the Jewish mainstream, but do not want to commit to the Orthodox way of life. Citizens in the formal sense, the rabbinate has left them in communal limbo - socially and culturally marginalized.

Israel's self-funded Reform and Masorti (Conservative) movements have been preparing some of these immigrants for conversion to Judaism. While the Orthodox state authorities won't accept these converts as "authentic" Jews, they are otherwise absorbed, spiritually and culturally, into Israel's mainstream. Many join synagogues and take succor in a tradition the Soviets had sought to rob them of.

We are delighted, therefore, that the High Court of Justice has ordered the state to start covering the expenses of non-Orthodox conversion institutes.

The beginning of the end of the Orthodox funding monopoly? Let's hope so.

Netanyahu & Obama...continued

Seeing linkage, plainly


Saeb Erekat, the hardline chief PLO negotiator, is described as "discouraged" and "disappointed" in The Washington Post by the outcome of Monday's White House meeting between Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and President Barack Obama.

He started out in a bad mood, telling The Jerusalem Post he opposed any friendly gestures by the Arab League toward Israel even if the Netanyahu government put a total freeze on "settlement" construction in Judea, Samaria... and metropolitan Jerusalem. And Aaron David Miller, a former US Middle East negotiator who leans left, told The New York Times that "Anyone who was expecting a major rift in the US-Israeli relationship is going to be disappointed."

It will take a while yet to get a handle on the direction Obama wants to take. How will he finesse the seemingly irreconcilable differences with Netanyahu exposed at Monday's meeting? On Iran, for one, Israel feels more acutely threatened than the US. And on the Palestinian issue - which Obama intimated should be solved en route to grappling with Iran - the president gave the impression that Israel's leadership could somehow rapidly enable the creation of a non-threatening Palestinian state

Netanyahu has foolishly allowed himself to be perceived as an obstacle to progress by making an issue over Palestinian statehood, when he could so easily have found an "in principle" formulation that would in no way have undermined his legitimate concerns about the dangers Palestinian sovereignty poses.

The Palestinian Arabs have been opposing a two-state solution ever since the British Mandate. Nowadays, the PLO says it wants "Palestine" and Israel to exist side by side - though you wouldn't know it from the way it behaves at the negotiating table.

An insight into why this is so comes from Hussein Agha and Robert Malley in the June 11 New York Review of Books: "For Palestinians, the most primal demands relate to addressing and redressing a historical experience of dispossession, expulsion, dispersal, massacres, occupation, discrimination, denial of dignity, persistent killing-off of their leaders, and the relentless fracturing of their national polity. These… yearnings are of a sort that, no matter how precisely fine-tuned, a two-state deal will find it hard to fulfill."

No matter. On Monday, Obama in effect told Netanyahu: You want our help in stopping Iran getting nuclear weapons? Ease your grip on the West Bank so the Palestinians can create their state there.

Exerting leverage in this way is nothing new, as veteran Israeli diplomat Zalman Shoval points out. Jimmy Carter tried to link aid to Israel with a settlement freeze; George H.W. Bush tried to link loan guarantees for the absorption of Soviet Jews to a settlement freeze; and he even linked Israeli concessions on the Palestinian front to gaining Arab cooperation in America's 1991 Gulf War.

WHAT MAKES the current situation unique is the gravity of the Iranian threat and the ascendency of Hamas and Hizbullah, combined with the fact that a charismatic American president, capable of using the "power to persuade" in a coherent and determined manner, is apparently becoming convinced - in part by ostensible "friends of Israel" - that Israeli intransigence is at the root of Palestinian and wider regional tension.

Obama is not the first president to watch some among the Jewish lobby pressuring Israel on behalf of US policy, rather than the other way around. For example, leading figures in the community facilitated the Reagan administration in its desire to diplomatically recognize the PLO in 1988.

Administrations have long enjoyed political cover for their Israel-related policies from elements in the US Jewish community. It is legitimate for Jewish Americans not to support Israeli policies; Jewish machers have been giving our premiers a piece of their minds since Nahum Goldmann first tried to set David Ben-Gurion straight. And it is legitimate for them to champion American policies to Israeli leaders. It's even fine for them to yell gevalt over Israeli policies.

Where American Jews cross the line is in proactively lobbying their government to pressure Israel into steps most Israelis strongly feel would put this country in jeopardy - and in doing so under the intellectually dishonest banner of being pro-Israel.

This is a challenging time for Diaspora Jews. Netanyahu has failed to define Israel's "red lines," or say unequivocally what he's for. Nevertheless, no one whose lobbying platform is indistinguishable from Erekat's should get away with telling you he's "pro-Israel."