Democracy for the Middle East
July 09, 2004Israeli Victory
Krauthammer on the defeat of the Palestinians:
For Israel, the victory is bitter. The past four years of terrorism have killed almost 1,000 Israelis and maimed thousands of others. But Israel has won strategically. The intent of the intifada was to demoralize Israel, destroy its economy, bring it to its knees, and thus force it to withdraw and surrender to Palestinian demands, just as Israel withdrew in defeat from southern Lebanon in May 2000.
That did not happen. Israel's economy was certainly wounded, but it is growing again. Tourism had dwindled to almost nothing at the height of the intifada, but tourists are returning. And the Israelis were never demoralized. They kept living their lives, the young people in particular returning to cafes and discos and buses just hours after a horrific bombing. Israelis turned out to be a lot tougher and braver than the Palestinians had imagined.
The end of the intifada does not mean the end of terrorism. There was terrorism before the intifada and there will be terrorism to come. What has happened, however, is an end to systematic, regular, debilitating, unstoppable terror -- terror as a reliable weapon. At the height of the intifada, there were nine suicide attacks in Israel killing 85 Israelis in just one month (March 2002). In the past three months there have been none.
The overall level of violence has been reduced by more than 70 percent. How did Israel do it? By ignoring its critics and launching a two-pronged campaign of self-defense.
First, Israel targeted terrorist leaders -- attacks so hypocritically denounced by Westerners who, at the same time, cheer the hunt for, and demand the head of, Osama bin Laden. The top echelon of Hamas and other terrorist groups has been either arrested, killed or driven underground. The others are now so afraid of Israeli precision and intelligence -- the last Hamas operative to be killed by missile was riding a motorcycle -- that they are forced to devote much of their time and energy to self-protection and concealment.
Second, the fence. Only about a quarter of the separation fence has been built, but its effect is unmistakable. The northern part is already complete, and attacks in northern Israel have dwindled to almost nothing.
This success does not just save innocent lives; it changes the strategic equation of the whole conflict.
Arafat failed, spectacularly. The violence did not bring Israel to its knees. Instead, it created chaos, lawlessness and economic disaster in the Palestinian areas. The Palestinians know the ruin that Arafat has brought, and they are beginning to protest it. He promised them blood and victory; he delivered on the blood.
Even more important, they have lost their place at the table. Israel is now defining a new equilibrium that will reign for years to come -- the separation fence is unilaterally drawing the line that separates Israelis and Palestinians. The Palestinians were offered the chance to negotiate that frontier at Camp David and chose war instead. Now they are paying the price.
It stands to reason. It is the height of absurdity to launch a terrorist war against Israel, then demand the right to determine the nature and route of the barrier built to prevent that very terrorism.
These new strategic realities are not just creating a new equilibrium, they are creating the first hope for peace since Arafat officially tore up the Oslo accords four years ago. Once Israel has withdrawn from Gaza and has completed the fence, terrorism as a strategic option will be effectively dead. The only way for the Palestinians to achieve statehood and dignity, and to determine the contours of their own state, will be to negotiate a final peace based on genuine coexistence with a Jewish state.
It could be a year, five years or a generation until the Palestinians come to that realization. The pity is that so many, Arab and Israeli, will have had to die before then.
Home . Posted by Editor at July 9, 2004 08:02 PM . DFME's new internet address is www.dfme.org
Comments on this post:
I fear Mr krauthammer is, as ususal, too American to grasp the Levant.
The Levant does not work along Mt Krauthammer's lines, lines of logic. The Arab levant has it's own rules, which go something like that (I am quoting Mr Friedman)
When I am weak, how can I compromise? When I am strong, why should I compromise?
The Arabs cannot, and will not, compromise on the basis of his beliefs.
1. Israel, having been part of Dar-Al-Islam may never belong to a non-muslim entity.
2. Jews were, are, and shall always be Dhimmis.
3. Jewish sovereignty anywhere in the Arab sphere is incoceivable.
Therefore when Arafat abdicated Camp David he was living up to these principles. He has no other choice, being a son of the Levant, son of the Islamic Brotherhood, nephew to Hajj Amin Al Husseini, the renowned Grossmufti.
Although Israel has won on the battlefield, it is steadily losing the Demographic war, spelling the doom of the Nation unless something is done.
Israel is waiting for a cue from France and Spain, previously of Dar-Al Islam, the future Islamic republics of Europe.
The Arabs will never, ever, come into this "realization", unless they renege on Fundamentalist Islam. America reneged on Judeophobic European Catholicism, and chose the unadulterated Bible. It is unlikely Arabs will follow in America's footsteps.
Posted by: yuval Brandstetter at July 12, 2004 10:47 AM
These Arab-Islamic "beliefs" could--over time--whither away (at least into the nearly inaccessible recesses of archane academic intigue). But, this will require a transformation of the Arab economy (society) and the birth-advancement of a middle-class that can confidently extinguish manifestations of extremism. Such would require seventy years of sustained development, which includes western abandonment of their rentier sponsorships.
But, in the meantime...Israel needs to do what is necessary. That is: mass population transfer. All Arabs out of the West Bank--with western sponsorship. The key, then, over the next few years is for liberals/progressives (like myself) to stop publicly propounding that population transfer is "ethnic cleansing", but rather that it has been a legitimate means for achieving peace, prosperity and self-determination over the past one hundred years. Shalom Steven
Posted by: Steven Karmi at August 9, 2004 07:58 AM
AlSdr like plstns uses Children
Al-Sadr like palestinians ( www.geocities.com/palestiniansarelies/HumanShields) using children as human shields
This Christian Science Monitor report about the standoff in Najaf blandly reports that children are inside the Shrine of Ali as human shields. Or at least one child. (Thanks to "Allah" for the link.) Inside the shrine itself, there were...
http://http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/002905.php
Posted by: Paulina at August 20, 2004 07:00 PM
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