Letter to an American Friend -- What You Need to Understand About the 2015 Israeli Elections --Two Days After

The New York Times seems to be having a hissy fit because of the Netanyahu victory. Tom Friedman, the Times editorial, Roger Cohen, Jodi Rudoren subtle tendentious coverage…

Yawn. One article I saw claimed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's "frank admission that he would never agree to a Palestinian state" justified the PLO's continuing push to have the international community unilaterally hand them everything they want -- without having to negotiate with Israel.

What Netanyahu actually said was: "I think that anyone who is going to establish a Palestinian state today and evacuate lands is giving attack grounds to the radical Islam against the state of Israel."

That's not a repudiation of his Bar-Ilan speech. It is simply facing the facts on the ground. It is verbalizing the obvious. (Albeit for partisan purposes to win an election.)

The Palestinians refused to reach a deal with Ehud Olmert and Ehud Barak. They are not about to recognize Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state. They are not about to de-militarize. They are not about to give up on the "right of return."

And, you know something, Tzipi Livni and Isaac Herzog could have done no better with the Palestinians than Barak or Olmert.

What about the actual election results?

Let's go over them. The number in parenthesis reflects seats in the current Knesset.

Netanyahu/Likud 30 (18)

Bennett/Jewish Home Party 8 (13)

Israel Beiteinu/ Lieberman 6 (12)

TOTAL HAWKS: 44 (43) +1

------------------------------

Lapid/Yesh Atid 11 (19)

Kahlon/Kulunu  10 (0)

TOTAL CENTER: 21 (19) -2

--------------------------------------

Herzog /Labor24 (15+6=21)

Galon/Meretz 4 (6)

TOTAL DOVES: 28 (27) +1

---------------------------------

Deri/Shas 7  (11)

Litzman/UTJ 7  (7)

TOTAL ULTRA ORTHODOX HAREDIM: 14 (18) -4

 --------------------------------------------

TOTAL ARABS: 14 (4+4+3=11) +3

(they ran as one party though in practice they will re-divide)

That changes everything…

Substantively, the elections change almost nothing. The ideological camps control roughly the same number of seats.

When will the new government be formed?

With any luck after Passover. More probably around Shavuot.

So why are the NYTimes and the White House in mourning?

 Here too, all but one major viewspaper (the one owned by Sheldon Adelson) and all the nightly views shows (sadly, there are no news programs anymore) are also in shock and with depressed anchors pulling their hair out. Even the adorable Yonit Levi

(if every dove looked like her, mamamia…)

Anyway, seeing them so downtrodden raised my spirits.  Except for Yonit, I mean.

Yes, but what about the peace process?

 One of Netanyahu's many weaknesses is that he is not skillful at giving the Americans and Europeans the sense of illusion of momentum they crave. He does not know how to deal with the supercilious Barack Obama.  But neither does Harry Reid.

As far as pulling back to the 1949 Armistice Lines – give or take – which is what the Obama administration is pushing for – that's not going to happen.

Why?

 Because territory and strategic depth matter STUPID. They matter a great deal in today's Middle East. A Palestinian state within walking distance of Tel Aviv makes the Jewish state too vulnerable. It means a couple of mortars can shut down our only airport. Hamas is already ensconced in Gaza. The Islamic State in nipping at Syria. God knows what will happen in Jordan. The PLO is weak and corrupt. How long they could hold Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) if the IDF did not control the Jordan Valley is anyone's guess. And the PLO itself is not just thuggish but is itself a danger to us.

Obama says he will reevaluate the peace process with Israel.

You mean like Gerald Ford did when he was president? That comes with the territory. No Israeli leader can cave to pressure that would have us pullback to the 1949 lines (a/k/a/ the 1967 boundaries).

It can't be that there is no difference between Netanyahu and Herzog.

Oh, there are plenty of differences. But on those you care about, the so-called peace process and on Iran's quest for nukes the two are on the same page. Though you'd not know it from the tone and spin.

Herzog would have let Livni spin with Mahmoud Abbas – there would have been lots of meetings and plenty of momentum. But when push comes to shove our minimum needs are well beyond anything the Palestinians can meet. Maybe that will change one day, who knows.

Right now, the Israeli center knows that the Palestinians remain committed to Israel's destruction. They are engaged in a zero sum game. The difference between Hamas and the PLO is purely over tactics

So you must be thrilled that Netanyahu won.

 Look, in Israel politics is a non-Zero sum game. I would have wanted to clip Netanyahu's wings and force him to form a broad national unity government.

I voted for Moshe Kahlon so I didn't have to vote for either Livni/Herzog or Netanyahu.

But now Netanyahu will be even more insufferable and arrogant. He is great at getting elected – he's a terrible manager of daily affairs.

You are painting a picture of a fragmented society

Yeah, but in this age of new media and hyper pluralism no more so than the US.

The prime minister did not win anything close to a majority – not in the popular vote and not in number of Knesset seats (30 out of 120). In Jerusalem, Likud captured 24 percent of the vote. In Tel Aviv, to take it from a different angle, Labor got just 34 percent.

Herzog says he will stay and lead the opposition.

That's unfortunate – that he won't consider forming a national unity government – but neither will Netanyahu. Maybe after Passover they may reconsider. Unlikely. As a result, we face the "international community," the Palestinian enemy, the Iranian enemy (I'll stop with the enemies) without any chance of building a national consensus. Not to mention this means badly needed electoral reform is still off the agenda. And Obama can continue to demonize Bibi (I wish he'd leave that to me).

Any good news?

Yes. Avigdor Lieberman has lost much of his influence. Eli Yishai and the unpleasant chauvinists he ran with did not get into the Knesset.

But lots of Arabs did…   

Three more than last time. I have no problem with that. That's representative government. The Arabs will accomplish little, though, if they reject coalition-building with the Zionist parties. If they poison the atmosphere than all the social issues we could make common cause on will be pushed aside… Also, the Arabs are divided between Islamists and nationalists and there are plenty of personal animosities just like among the Jews….

Let me get this straight – you're NOT worried about Obama?

I am very worried about Obama. For the most part, Washington protected Jerusalem from the tyrannical majority not just in the General Assembly but in the Security Council too. 
Obama will now probably threaten to let us hang alone. He will encourage the Palestinians to use the UN against us.

If Netanyahu can start being clever, he can out maneuver Obama – not with crass appeals to the Republicans but with smart statecraft and diplomacy.

Anything else?

Yeah. Wish us luck. It's gonna be a bumpy ride until 2016 and bumpier still if Jeb Bush or Hillary Clinton replace Obama in the White House.

Stay in touch.

Mr. Netanyahu Goes to Washington

What do you make of the retired generals who say Benjamin Netanyahu is jeopardizing relations with Washington?

I say a plague on both your houses.

This group of dovish retired Israel military and intelligence officers organized under the rubric of Commanders for Israel's Security has denounced Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for damaging relations with the United States.

And no doubt he and his ambassador to Washington Ron Dermer have. Either out of ineptitude or hubris they've managed to take the spotlight off Iran and shine it brightly (and unflatteringly) on Netanyahu. And they've managed to give wobbly Jewish liberals yet another excuse to take sides against Israel.

The ex-officers said that Netanyahu's address to Congress on Tuesday, against Obama administration efforts to cut a nuclear deal with Iran, would do nothing to slow down Iran's quest for nuclear weapons.

Well, that's pretty obvious. A president can enter into an agreement of this kind without the advise and consent of Congress.

So you stand shoulder-to-shoulder with IDF armored corps ex-general, Amnon Reshef, founder of Commanders for Israel's Security?

I just happen to agree with him on this one point. 

By the way, I'm curious about who handles his public relations and who stands behind the people who are arranging his publicity.

Anyway, in November, Reshef told the Yediot Aharanot viewspaper that he was "absolutely" convinced it was possible to establish a Palestinian state that posed no threat to Israeli security -- with the support of the Arab countries  -- if Netanyahu were willing to be "courageous."

That's a pretty delusional claim. 

A pullback practically to the 1949 Armistice Lines? Now? When the countries surrounding us are wracked by instability? When the Palestinian polity is divided between Hamas and the PLO? Or "worse" and "worser." When every previous Israeli pullout led to a poorer security outcome than the status quo? When the "moderate" PLO remains committed to the principle that Jews have no legitimate place anywhere in the region…

Amiram Levin, a former Mossad officer who was also Netanyahu's commander in an IDF special forces unit, said that the mullahs in Iran were glad to see a rift develop between the Obama administration and Jerusalem. "Iran wants Netanyahu's speech. They understand that it will weaken Israel's bipartisan bond with the United States."

I certainly don't disagree. Though since the generals knew their statement would not persuade Netanyahu to scuttle the Washington trip – aren't they also feeding into Iran's desires?

"It's hard for me to speak out against Bibi," Levin said using Netanyahu's nickname. "I was his commander. I recruited him. I taught him how to navigate and I'm telling him now: 'Bibi, you've made an error in navigation. The objective ought to be Tehran, not Washington,'" the Hebrew-language tabloid Ma'ariv reported.

Look, history shows that many of those who know Bibi up close and personal, who worked for him, have, on the whole come to despise him.

In the March 17 elections, Bibi is running against Avigdor Lieberman and Naftali Bennett both of whom were once close aides. He's not known to engender loyalty.

Another ex-general, Giora Rom said Jerusalem should not be "fighting" President Barack Obama. "There are more suitable ways to deal with the Iranian agreement being worked on rather than going to Congress like this," the WPost reported.

That horse has left the barn.

It's basically too late.

No American administration-- and certainly not Obama's-- is going to go to war against Iran in order to stop them from developing an atom bomb. See North Korea as a precedent. 

The tragedy of the George W. Bush administration is that by going to war with Iraq it not only unleashed the Pandora's Box of sectarian Muslim-on-Muslim bloodletting, de-stabilized the Arab nation-state system, set the stage for the so-called Arab Spring, but that the Iraq war secured Iran as a regional powerbroker.

Netanyahu should apologize to Congress for egging Bush on in those days though he was not in office and Ehud Olmert was. The unintended consequences of the Iraq war have proved to be disastrous all around.

And if Netanyahu really believed Israel faced an immediate, existential danger – why talk, talk, talk? I don't recall Menachem Begin blustering before ordering the air-force to destroy Saddam Hussein's nuclear reactor. Obviously, every Israeli premier since Rabin (in his second term) will have to answer to history for letting Iran get this far.

Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon defended Netanyahu's decision to go ahead with the speech. "There is a huge gap between how we see things and how the Americans see them. We could capitulate and grovel, but this is a historic moment – and if we don't act correctly, history will judge us badly."

I like Ya'alon but I doubt his political instincts. I think he meant "how Obama's administration sees them."

Wait. Are you saying, though, that 180 Israeli generals, ex-Mossad and ex-Shin Bet are wrong to be "dovish" as you so dismissively label them?

As prime minister's former Israeli generals have been willing to take risks for peace. Yitzhak Rabin signed the catastrophic 1993 Oslo Accords which brought Yasser Arafat out of Tunisian exile and established him as head of the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah. Ariel Sharon uprooted 21 Israeli settlements and pulled IDF forces out of the Gaza Strip in 2005. [mea culpa, I supported what he did at the time.] And the feckless Ehud Barak offered to turn over the Golan Heights to Syria when he was prime minister in 1999.

So much for the prescience of ex-generals.

Yemen's Remnant Jewish Community Faces Fresh Persecution - But why are there any Jews still in Yemen?

The safety of the less than 100 Jews remaining in Yemen has deteriorated since Houthi "militants" solidified control of the country in February, The New York Times reported.

The remnant Yemeni Jewish community lives mostly in the northern town of Raida and in the capital of Sana. 

Among the 55 Jews in Raida—  children, elderly people, very few singles— are Abraham Jacob, 36, who like most of his male coreligionists is identifiable by his curly earlocks or payot, the Times reported.

The plight of the Jews has only gotten more precarious since the regime of Ali Abdullah Saleh was overthrown by the Houthis, who are Shiite Arabs (of the Zaidi sect) aligned with the Shiite Persians of Iran.

The official Houthi slogan is "Death to America, death to Israel, damnation to the Jews."

Note that radical Islamists don't get bogged down in the distinction between Jews and the Jewish state. 

When he goes to the market Jacob is routinely taunted as a "dirty Jew"

"We have no friends," he told a Times reporter, "so we just try to stay away from everyone as much as we can."

Saleh had been prevailed upon to create a protected ghetto for the Jews in Sana near the U.S. embassy. 

Now both the U.S. embassy and the former strongman are gone. 

There are an estimated 20 to 40 Jews in the capital living under virtual house arrest, the Times reported.

Suleiman Jacob, 45, Abraham's eldest brother tucks his earlocks under an Arabic-style headdress to avoid bullying. "It's a shame that we have to do that sometimes, but we do," he said.

"Honestly," Suleiman said, "we are a little afraid of the Houthi takeover and don't know what to do about it." He adds, "There isn't a single one of us here who doesn't want to leave. Soon there will be no Jews in Yemen, inshallah," meaning "God willing" in Arabic.

Community members would prefer to emigrate to the United States, which they say is safer than Israel, according to the Times.

Worth keeping in mind that what little they know about Israel is filtered through the local Arabic-language media. 

Saleh, though Shiite, had opposed the Houthis and aligned Yemen with Washington. Sunnis comprise about 65 percent of the population and al-Qaida has a strong presence in the country.

The Sunni majority is being wooed by al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP).

The Sunni tribes may not like al-Qaida but with the Shiite Houthis banging at the door they may be forced to align with Sunnis "militants." 

The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that AQAP has been taking advantage of the political vacuum in Yemen -- capturing military bases formerly loyal to the strongman Saleh.

To make matters murkier, some Sunni tribes are hooking up with the Islamic State – abandoning al-Qaida – as a balance against the advancing Shiites.

The rule of thumb in Arabia and throughout the Arab world is always align with the Strong Horse. The barbarians of the Islamic State seem like a safer bet than the al-Qaida fanatics.

Back to the Jews. 

Yemen's Jewish community predates the founding of Islam in the 7th century C.E.  Ponder that: there were Jews in Arabia before there were Muslims in Arabia.

There was never a reliable modern-era census of Jews in Yemen. Some 16,000 Jews emigrated to Palestine prior to Israeli independence in 1948.

By 1950, 43,000 Jews had been airlifted out of Yemen to Israel. 

In 1968 there were believed to be 200 Jews in the country, according to the Encyclopedia Judaica.

The Times story begs the question: why would any Jews opt to stay in Yemen even during the comparatively better days before the Houthis?

There are very human reasons for that. People will often choose the familiar (language, landscape, and "home") over starting a new life elsewhere. 

Those portrayed in the Times piece must be stalwarts of the better-the-devil-you-know worldview. And kudos to the Times for doing the story (even if it includes a subliminal zinger at Israel).

Incidentally, the staunchly anti-Zionist Satmar hassidic sect has worked to discourage Zionist-oriented aliya to Israel. On the other hand, they've been involved in rescuing the remnant Jews of Yemen for years – even moving some to South America as an interim measure. No one else seemed much interested, apparently, since the remnant chose to stay when they could have left for Israel.

Footnote: Saudi Arabia which already is building a security barrier along its border with Yemen is embarking on a security fence with Iraq as well. Egyptian troops are being deployed in Saudi Arabia along its border with Iraq.

All this illustrates (again) how mistaken is the myth that the Palestinian Arab struggle to destroy Israel is the root of Middle East instability.

Political Delineation after Paris

Doves/left-libs compelled to argue there is no war of civilizations.

Hawks/realists see the war of civilizations for what it is.

Hawks/realists also see that war of civilizations is playing out foremost within Islamic civilization.

Doves/left-libs/post-Zionists/anti-Zionists -- the gang at The New York Times and Guardian -- want Europe to maintain its policy of anti-Israelism.

They want Israel pushed back to 1949 Armistice Lines and the creation of a Palestinian state that, deep down they know, sooner rather than later will become an Islamist bastion.

World leaders marching in Paris today are united against a tactic… "terrorism." 

As AIPAC takes a lesser role on Capitol Hill, Muslim Americans Begin to Flex Their Political Muscle

More than 15,000 delegates attended this year's annual convention of the Muslim American Society and the Islamic Circle of North America in Chicago. The gathering which ran from December 25 to 29 was held at the mammoth McCormick Place convention center in Chicago, according to OnIslam.

Only 500 delegates took part in the first convention just after the al-Qaida attacks on the U.S. in 2001.

This year's convention speakers included Tariq Ramadan, grandson of Muslim Brotherhood founder Hasan al-Banna, Jamal Badawi, a Muslim scholar sympathetic to Hamas, and Kristiane Backer, a German television presenter and convert to Islam. ‏

Organizers had reportedly planned for Indiana Democratic Rep. André Carson to take part on a Ferguson panel with Mazen Mokhtar. He has been tied by law enforcement authorities in the U.S. and Britain to al-Qaida's website and to fundraising efforts for the Taliban.

Carson was a featured speaker at the convention. One of two Muslims in Congress— the other is Minnesota Democratic Rep. Keith Ellison— Carson spoke on the "importance of civil engagement and developing leaders in the community," according to a statement  put out by his office. 

He said that he only attended the dinner and did not take part in any panel devoted to Ferguson. Carson added that he would "never associate with any individual or organization trying to harm the United States of America or its citizens."

Pro-Islamist groups in the U.S. have contributed at least $34,000 to Carson's congressional war chest. He also spoke at the 2012 convention where he advocated that U.S. schools look to Muslim madrassas, which teach the Koran, as an educational model, according to the Middle East Forum.

A promotional video for the just concluded event emphasized that Muslim Americans needed to work together to spread the values of Islam. 

There are about 6-8 million Muslims in the U.S. according to convention organizers.  This year, non-Arab Turkish Americans also took part in the convention, World Bulletin reported.

AIPAC seems to be taking a more backseat role -- doing less real public advocacy.  Many U.S. Jews are not particularly concerned about Israel. Some, paradoxically, express their Jewishness by jumping on the bandwagon to "end the occupation" -- in other words, to force Israel back to the 1949 Armistice Lines and install a Palestinian polity in Judea and Samaria that will be a real and present danger to life in Israel.

If Muslims manage to melt a bit more into the melting pot as Jews continue to melt away through out-marriage and illiteracy of their heritage -- the American lobby for Israel will become totally reliant on our Christian friends.