The response of the civilized world to events in southern Lebanon—where Hizballah, in preparation for its next act of aggression, is reportedly digging tunnels at the border with northern Israel—is doubly revealing. It says much about the non-enforcement of international law in an area dominated by Islamist irregular forces. And it is a reliable indicator of what might happen if, in the event of an agreement between the Palestinian leadership and Israel, international peacekeepers were to be stationed in the West Bank and Gaza.
The UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) has been an ineffective presence in south Lebanon dating back to 1978, when the area was subjugated by Palestinian gunmen. But in 2006 the force's mandate was enlarged under Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the Second Lebanon War, to include monitoring the ceasefire between Israel and Hizballah and supporting a 15,000-strong contingent of Lebanese troops south of the Litani River. The resolution, which has no real enforcement mechanism, also calls for the disarming of "all militias" (read: Hizballah) and an end to arms smuggling (meaning from Syria and Iran to Hizballah). But the militia is booming, and the smuggling is unabated.
Meanwhile, only 6,000 Lebanese troops have been deployed; anticipating trouble with Hizballah, they have been known to refuse to accompany UNIFIL in carrying out maneuvers that could rile the terrorist militia. After a recent incident in which weapons of French peacekeepers were seized, a UNIFIL officer was wounded, and an armored vehicle was vandalized by "villagers," Beirut promised to send 5,000 more soldiers to the south and France has reportedly offered to bolster its presence. But the UN has yet to respond to France's offer, and all it could muster in response to the "villagers'" depredations against its forces was a limp Security Council plea, addressed to no one in particular, for ensuring the "safety and freedom of movement of the peacekeepers."
"We are fully aware of the problems [UN] military operations in civilian areas may cause," said UNIFIL commander Alberto Asarta Cuevas at a meeting with village chiefs to urge greater "dialogue" with his peacekeepers. No doubt. With any number of private homes serving as Hizballah arms depots, or sitting astride bunkers and command centers, unrestricted UNIFIL access would clearly have the potential to cause friction.
The Israeli army recently declassified intelligence it has gathered concerning Hizballah's deployment in southern Lebanon and handed its findings to the UN. According to the IDF's copious documentation, Hizballah has positioned weapons caches less than 200 feet from schools and hospitals, embedded some 20,000 militia members inside 160 villages, and camouflaged 40,000 short-, medium- and long-range missiles—the last being capable of striking Tel Aviv. In the village of Khiam, located twelve miles from the Israeli city of Kiryat Shmona, there are no fewer than ten weapons-storage facilities. Also operating in the area, unhindered by UNIFIL, are Iranian military advisers.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon responded to the IDF's revelations with a stern rebuke—of Israel. He holds Jerusalem to blame for raising "the specter of a miscalculation by either party leading to a resumption of hostilities, with potentially devastating consequences for Lebanon and the region."
In fact, the IDF may have had a much more specific aim in mind, and Ban Ki-Moon may have guessed it. By publicizing some of what it knows about Hizballah's deployment of forces amid the civilian population in south Lebanon, Israel may intend to signal that, in any future round of fighting, non-combatant casualties will be the legal and moral responsibility of Hizballah—and, ultimately, of UNIFIL itself, the body charged with preventing the very situation it has permitted to develop.
Beyond the case of southern Lebanon, the utter lack of any international will to disarm Hizballah, or to penalize Syria and Iran for unlawfully arming it, delivers a stark lesson to Israelis about the folly of delegating their country's security, particularly in the West Bank, to peacekeepers under the aegis of the United Nations, NATO, or any other international body
-- July 2010
Friday, September 24, 2010
UNIFIL: Peacekeepers or Enablers?
I am an Israel briefer and analyst, a political scientist, and a speaker on Jewish civilization. I'm also a rewrite guy & fact-checker, who can make your writing clear and compelling & help you contextualize.
Christianity in the Middle East
Pope Benedict XVI's visit to Cyprus on Sunday was marred by events that cast their own, baleful light on the purpose of his mission: to unveil a Vatican position paper on the deteriorating condition of Christianity in the Middle East. Hours before his arrival, one of the document's authors, Bishop Luigi Padovese, the apostolic vicar of Anatolia, was murdered by his "mentally unstable" driver. Padovese had only recently met with Turkish authorities to discuss the problems of that country's tiny Christian minority—and had previously extended Christian forgiveness to a Muslim youth who in 2006 murdered a Catholic priest. Three more Turkish Christians were murdered in their Bible publishing house in 2007.
The draft document, "The Catholic Church in the Middle East," exemplifies the tightrope walked by the Vatican with regard to the ever-worsening circumstance of Christianity in the region. Worried about the dwindling indigenous communities of Christian Arabs and about newly arriving Christian workers from Asia, but with an eye to Islamic sensibilities, the paper artfully cites Israel's "occupation of Palestinian territories" as harming Christian Arabs no less than their Muslim compatriots. In its Italian-language version, as the New York Times points out, the document goes further, explicitly warning against the use of the Bible "to justify the political injustice imposed on the Palestinians." In this same connection the Church also thoroughly dissociates itself from "certain Christian fundamentalist theologies"—in other words, Christian Zionism with its unstinting support of Israel.
But the heart of the document—cushioned by its de-rigueur genuflecting to the Palestinian cause—is the assertion that "Oftentimes, relations between Christians and Muslims are difficult, principally because Muslims make no distinction between religion and politics, thereby relegating Christians to the precarious position of being considered non-citizens." "Too often," it hastens to add, Muslims mistakenly identify Christianity with the West—even though "modernity" also poses risks to Christians. Finally, the Church warns against active Christian proselytizing among Muslims.
Early in his papacy, at Regensburg in Germany, Benedict quoted an "erudite Byzantine emperor" talking with "startling brusqueness" about Islamic religious violence. If his intention then was to engage Muslims in vigorous but reasoned polemical disputation, it failed; many of his hoped-for interlocutors reacted with rage, some by killing Christians and burning churches. Four years later, the tone of "The Catholic Church in the Middle East" suggests an abandonment of any claims to religious rights and justice in favor of a plea for Muslim forbearance.
-- June 2010
The draft document, "The Catholic Church in the Middle East," exemplifies the tightrope walked by the Vatican with regard to the ever-worsening circumstance of Christianity in the region. Worried about the dwindling indigenous communities of Christian Arabs and about newly arriving Christian workers from Asia, but with an eye to Islamic sensibilities, the paper artfully cites Israel's "occupation of Palestinian territories" as harming Christian Arabs no less than their Muslim compatriots. In its Italian-language version, as the New York Times points out, the document goes further, explicitly warning against the use of the Bible "to justify the political injustice imposed on the Palestinians." In this same connection the Church also thoroughly dissociates itself from "certain Christian fundamentalist theologies"—in other words, Christian Zionism with its unstinting support of Israel.
But the heart of the document—cushioned by its de-rigueur genuflecting to the Palestinian cause—is the assertion that "Oftentimes, relations between Christians and Muslims are difficult, principally because Muslims make no distinction between religion and politics, thereby relegating Christians to the precarious position of being considered non-citizens." "Too often," it hastens to add, Muslims mistakenly identify Christianity with the West—even though "modernity" also poses risks to Christians. Finally, the Church warns against active Christian proselytizing among Muslims.
Early in his papacy, at Regensburg in Germany, Benedict quoted an "erudite Byzantine emperor" talking with "startling brusqueness" about Islamic religious violence. If his intention then was to engage Muslims in vigorous but reasoned polemical disputation, it failed; many of his hoped-for interlocutors reacted with rage, some by killing Christians and burning churches. Four years later, the tone of "The Catholic Church in the Middle East" suggests an abandonment of any claims to religious rights and justice in favor of a plea for Muslim forbearance.
-- June 2010
I am an Israel briefer and analyst, a political scientist, and a speaker on Jewish civilization. I'm also a rewrite guy & fact-checker, who can make your writing clear and compelling & help you contextualize.
American Jewish Congress: The End?
Shrunken and wizened, the American Jewish Congress lies on its evident death bed, debilitated by a loss of raison d'être as much as by Bernard Madoff's financial depredations. Under the circumstances, reflections on the spotty record of its approach to Jewish life, or on waste and duplication in the alphabet soup of the Jewish organizational world, may forgivably give way to a longer-term look at a once-proud agency's origins and purposes.
The AJCongress was established in 1918, largely by "downtown" East European Jews out to challenge "uptown" German Reform Jews and their flagship agency, the American Jewish Committee, founded twelve years earlier. The downtowners, no underachievers themselves, were irked by the AJCommittee's elitism and its antipathy toward Zionism. The idea for a more representative umbrella group, which began to germinate as early as 1915, gained momentum in response to the AJCommittee's unenthusiastic reaction to the 1917 Balfour Declaration.
After World War I, the new "congress" lobbied the Versailles conference on behalf of Europe's remaining Jewish communities. While some uptowners, led by Adolph Ochs of the New York Times, were urging President Woodrow Wilson not to support the Balfour Declaration, the downtowners pressured from the opposite direction.
The congress was supposed to disband after Versailles, but in 1928 an ad-hoc coalition of Orthodox, Zionist, and fraternal groups reassembled under Stephen Wise and ultimately reconstituted themselves as an independent membership organization. Unlike the AJCommittee, which worked behind the scenes, the new AJCongress engaged in direct action. In the 1930s it organized boycotts of goods from Nazi Germany. In 1942, convinced that reports of Hitler's genocide were true, it held a mass rally at New York's Madison Square Garden—although Wise also acquiesced in FDR's ruling that the rescue of European Jewry would have to wait until the fighting ended.
In the postwar era, the AJCongress co-founded the National Conference on Soviet Jewry and established a niche for itself with its 1960s campaign against the Arab economic boycott of Israel. But its main passions centered on domestic American affairs, where, faithful to the left-liberal agenda, it positioned itself as the Jewish community's progressive lawyer: challenging restrictive clubs, litigating for the rigid separation of church and state, backing special legal dispensations for American blacks, and opposing the Vietnam war.
In the late 60s and 70s the AJCongress came under sharp criticism for its conspicuous failure to speak out against roiling black anti-Semitism and for its opposition to Jewish parochial schools. In response, AJCongress leaders claimed that some Jews preferred day-school education for their children "not because they loved God but because they were afraid of the Negro." In time they would re-think such reckless aspersions, somewhat modifying the agency's position in the process.
By now, in any case, much of the Jewish communal agenda had become dominated by Israel. Like other liberal establishment figures, AJCongress leaders were aghast and befuddled at the 1977 election of Menachem Begin as Israel's prime minister. Arthur Hertzberg, the group's president, sought to sever support for the Jewish state from support of its government, especially when it came to settlements in the Israel-administered territories. Joachim Prinz, a former president and staunch Begin foe, prophesied that the community's obsession with Israel would damage its own spiritual well-being. Henry Siegman, the agency's executive director during the crucial period 1978–1994, went on to become one of Israel's harshest critics.
Always junior to the Anti-Defamation League and AJCommittee, the AJCongress survived on communal money, its own fundraising, and the "memberships" of tourists visiting Israel through its travel service. In its heyday, it boasted 300 chapters and published a fortnightly newsletter and the quarterly Judaism. But by the 1990s the agency was moribund. Both its leaders and its base had moved on, as new organizations on either end of the political spectrum—and, in the liberal center, its old nemesis the AJCommittee—were rendering it redundant or irrelevant.
All the more reason, then, to recall the once-revolutionary contributions made by this organization in behalf of Zionism, a more representative Jewish leadership, and the willingness forthrightly to pursue Jewish interests in the public square.
-- July 2010
The AJCongress was established in 1918, largely by "downtown" East European Jews out to challenge "uptown" German Reform Jews and their flagship agency, the American Jewish Committee, founded twelve years earlier. The downtowners, no underachievers themselves, were irked by the AJCommittee's elitism and its antipathy toward Zionism. The idea for a more representative umbrella group, which began to germinate as early as 1915, gained momentum in response to the AJCommittee's unenthusiastic reaction to the 1917 Balfour Declaration.
After World War I, the new "congress" lobbied the Versailles conference on behalf of Europe's remaining Jewish communities. While some uptowners, led by Adolph Ochs of the New York Times, were urging President Woodrow Wilson not to support the Balfour Declaration, the downtowners pressured from the opposite direction.
The congress was supposed to disband after Versailles, but in 1928 an ad-hoc coalition of Orthodox, Zionist, and fraternal groups reassembled under Stephen Wise and ultimately reconstituted themselves as an independent membership organization. Unlike the AJCommittee, which worked behind the scenes, the new AJCongress engaged in direct action. In the 1930s it organized boycotts of goods from Nazi Germany. In 1942, convinced that reports of Hitler's genocide were true, it held a mass rally at New York's Madison Square Garden—although Wise also acquiesced in FDR's ruling that the rescue of European Jewry would have to wait until the fighting ended.
In the postwar era, the AJCongress co-founded the National Conference on Soviet Jewry and established a niche for itself with its 1960s campaign against the Arab economic boycott of Israel. But its main passions centered on domestic American affairs, where, faithful to the left-liberal agenda, it positioned itself as the Jewish community's progressive lawyer: challenging restrictive clubs, litigating for the rigid separation of church and state, backing special legal dispensations for American blacks, and opposing the Vietnam war.
In the late 60s and 70s the AJCongress came under sharp criticism for its conspicuous failure to speak out against roiling black anti-Semitism and for its opposition to Jewish parochial schools. In response, AJCongress leaders claimed that some Jews preferred day-school education for their children "not because they loved God but because they were afraid of the Negro." In time they would re-think such reckless aspersions, somewhat modifying the agency's position in the process.
By now, in any case, much of the Jewish communal agenda had become dominated by Israel. Like other liberal establishment figures, AJCongress leaders were aghast and befuddled at the 1977 election of Menachem Begin as Israel's prime minister. Arthur Hertzberg, the group's president, sought to sever support for the Jewish state from support of its government, especially when it came to settlements in the Israel-administered territories. Joachim Prinz, a former president and staunch Begin foe, prophesied that the community's obsession with Israel would damage its own spiritual well-being. Henry Siegman, the agency's executive director during the crucial period 1978–1994, went on to become one of Israel's harshest critics.
Always junior to the Anti-Defamation League and AJCommittee, the AJCongress survived on communal money, its own fundraising, and the "memberships" of tourists visiting Israel through its travel service. In its heyday, it boasted 300 chapters and published a fortnightly newsletter and the quarterly Judaism. But by the 1990s the agency was moribund. Both its leaders and its base had moved on, as new organizations on either end of the political spectrum—and, in the liberal center, its old nemesis the AJCommittee—were rendering it redundant or irrelevant.
All the more reason, then, to recall the once-revolutionary contributions made by this organization in behalf of Zionism, a more representative Jewish leadership, and the willingness forthrightly to pursue Jewish interests in the public square.
-- July 2010
I am an Israel briefer and analyst, a political scientist, and a speaker on Jewish civilization. I'm also a rewrite guy & fact-checker, who can make your writing clear and compelling & help you contextualize.
Understanding AIPAC
Against a background of sharp disagreement between Washington and Jerusalem, the annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee winds down today.
On Monday, the 7,500 delegates—Jews, Christians, African Americans, as well as European and Canadian activists—heard Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declare that the United States would tell Israel the "truth" when "difficult but necessary choices" had to be made. Today, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is scheduled to meet President Barack Obama. Delegates from all 50 states planned to spend Tuesday on Capitol Hill speaking with their respective Senators and Members of Congress.
But what is AIPAC, and what does it mean to be pro-Israel at a time when many American Jews are said to be discomfited by actions of the Israeli government and tensions with Washington?
Its name notwithstanding, AIPAC is not a political-action committee created to give money to friendly politicians. Nor is it a foreign lobby. Founded in the 1950's, AIPAC aimed at becoming America's premier, bipartisan, homegrown pro-Israel pressure group. The group's incumbent president is usually a communal leader, Republican or Democrat, with strong ties to the administration then in power. Its current head, Lee Rosenberg from Illinois, was among Obama's staunchest Jewish supporters during the 2008 campaign.
But AIPAC has also become a lightning rod for the animus of those who essentially oppose all Israeli security policies while insisting they favor the country's "right to exist." In The Lobby: Jewish Political Power and American Foreign Policy (1987), the journalist Edward Tivnan charged AIPAC with unprecedented influence over Congress. In The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy (2007), the "realist" academics John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt updated and amplified Tivnan's critique, positing that an all-powerful lobby was "silencing any debate at all" on the Middle East, rendering impossible the proper pursuit of American interests, and, through its blind support of Israel's West Bank policies, helping to foment anti-American terrorism.
In reality, AIPAC's leadership includes both supporters and opponents of Israel's West Bank policies. What the organization embraces is a pro-Israel model that leaves to Israelis themselves decisions of existential consequence, reached through the consensus of the country's body politic. AIPAC thus emphatically favors a two-state solution; insists on direct talks between Arabs and Israelis; holds the Palestinians to be the recalcitrant party; and robustly rejects any outside imposition of a "solution."
Is this any different from the model embraced by the overwhelming majority of the American people, and confirmed in survey after survey of national opinion?
-- March 2010
On Monday, the 7,500 delegates—Jews, Christians, African Americans, as well as European and Canadian activists—heard Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declare that the United States would tell Israel the "truth" when "difficult but necessary choices" had to be made. Today, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is scheduled to meet President Barack Obama. Delegates from all 50 states planned to spend Tuesday on Capitol Hill speaking with their respective Senators and Members of Congress.
But what is AIPAC, and what does it mean to be pro-Israel at a time when many American Jews are said to be discomfited by actions of the Israeli government and tensions with Washington?
Its name notwithstanding, AIPAC is not a political-action committee created to give money to friendly politicians. Nor is it a foreign lobby. Founded in the 1950's, AIPAC aimed at becoming America's premier, bipartisan, homegrown pro-Israel pressure group. The group's incumbent president is usually a communal leader, Republican or Democrat, with strong ties to the administration then in power. Its current head, Lee Rosenberg from Illinois, was among Obama's staunchest Jewish supporters during the 2008 campaign.
But AIPAC has also become a lightning rod for the animus of those who essentially oppose all Israeli security policies while insisting they favor the country's "right to exist." In The Lobby: Jewish Political Power and American Foreign Policy (1987), the journalist Edward Tivnan charged AIPAC with unprecedented influence over Congress. In The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy (2007), the "realist" academics John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt updated and amplified Tivnan's critique, positing that an all-powerful lobby was "silencing any debate at all" on the Middle East, rendering impossible the proper pursuit of American interests, and, through its blind support of Israel's West Bank policies, helping to foment anti-American terrorism.
In reality, AIPAC's leadership includes both supporters and opponents of Israel's West Bank policies. What the organization embraces is a pro-Israel model that leaves to Israelis themselves decisions of existential consequence, reached through the consensus of the country's body politic. AIPAC thus emphatically favors a two-state solution; insists on direct talks between Arabs and Israelis; holds the Palestinians to be the recalcitrant party; and robustly rejects any outside imposition of a "solution."
Is this any different from the model embraced by the overwhelming majority of the American people, and confirmed in survey after survey of national opinion?
-- March 2010
I am an Israel briefer and analyst, a political scientist, and a speaker on Jewish civilization. I'm also a rewrite guy & fact-checker, who can make your writing clear and compelling & help you contextualize.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)