Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal (2004)

hey, israel will no longer be occupying gaza. that's good.

is there anything, well, anybody does that doesn't result in arab commentators whining? short of every jew in the world moving to long island, you're going to hear, "this is going to make peace impossible!"

of course, even when one side cries wolf all the time, the other side can still be wrong.

I second that question--what specific thing would Bush have to do to get Arab commentators on his side? Make the sun stand still?

Whenever Bush does personal diplomacy, with Putin or Prince Bandar, but especially with Sharon, I just assume that he's going to get rolled. Those are three very shrewd, strong-willed guys, and Bush isn't. (He thinks that being pushy, stubborn and loud is strong, but it isn't).

It's hard to know where to start, since I don't like what he does when he's being babysat by Cheney and Rumsfeld either, but when he's one-on-one with a sharp adversary (or ally) he seems particularly frightening.

It would seem impossible to simultaneously be punking for Ariel Sharon and Prince Bandar, but Bush can pull it off.

Adrian will now explain how Bush is a great, Churchillian statesman, whereas I am blinded by partisan prejudice, left-wing dogma, and my own evil nature.

What specific thing would Bush have to do to get Arab commentators on his side?

Quit.

Link led to article: sexy scions sell selves.

"Israel won't be occupying Gaza. That's good."

Right, but Israel will be occupying major portions of the West Bank. That's bad. Look at a map which shows where those settlements are; it would split any possible Palestinian state almost in half. GWB says he's still for said state, but we have seen what happens to geographically-separated states. Pakistan was once West and East, remember? Hence Bangladesh.

"What specific thing would Bush have to do to get Arab commentators on his side?"

In general? Not have unilaterally invaded Iraq, and not bend over so far backwards to the Israelis.

I mean, really, what does Israel have to offer the US these days anyway? What does the US get for fucking over the Palestinians, and alienating the Arab world by being so partisan? In what way is Israeli friendship worth more than a bucket of lukewarm spit, strategically speaking?

They're not a base for troops, they're not an actual military ally since the whole region would go apeshit if they invaded an Arab nation, they don't have oil, they don't serve as a US proxy since they're always looking out for number one, they don't stabilize their neighbors. They buy US weapons but any profits from that are erased by the billions in aid they get. They're not particularly big as a technology or trade partner, certainly not enough to stick out America's neck for.

What does Israel have to offer? It's the only country that remotely resembles a democracy in the Middle East. We have an interest in democracies not being overthrown from without or terrorized by suicide bombers.

The uproar over Bush's statement seems to me misplaced. The comments about the West Bank are ill-conceived, but nothing on that front has been set in stone. Pulling out of Gaza is obviously a good thing. And making it clear that there is no, and never will be, a right to return just makes explicit something that the Palestinians were going to have to accept if they ever wanted a homeland. Continuing to foster, in even an implicit way, the delusion that refugees would ever be allowed to return to Haifa, et.al., served no one's interests (save perhaps Arafat), least of all the Palestinian people's.

The trouble is simply that Bush unnecessarily pumped a little more gasoline on an already-roaring anti-Semitic fire in the Moslem world by caving in COMPLETELY to Sharon -- specifically, on our now having no objection to Israel permanently annexing big chunks of the West Bank (not just little flecks, as Ehud Barak suggested), and on not even allowing some small token number of Arabs refugees to return to Israel proper (or, alternatively, paying the refugees some monetary sum as recompense -- as Barak also suggested).

Even given the enormous problems the US would have dealing with the Moslem world in any case, what we have here is simply still further proof that Bush is a numbskull -- whether he is doing this out of Electoral College calculations presented to him by Karl Rove (as the Washington Post suggests), or because he personally has Looked Into Sharon's Soul Through His Eyes and decided that he is a Truly Honorable Man (the way he did with Putin, although we haven't been hearing much about that lately).

"hey, israel will no longer be occupying gaza. that's good. ''

My guess is that most Palestinians are not as stupid as that statement. But then it is this very stupidity that Bush is counting on.

Well, let's see if this is true:

Sharon Threatened to Halt Trip to See Bush, Aide Says -NYTimes

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/16/international/middleeast/16shar.html

I agree with Zizka and Moomaw. Particularly "caving in COMPLETELY to Sharon"

Yes, withdrawing from Gaza might be good. But look at it on a map. And consider it is one of the most densely populated places in the world. And the poorest. What is the plan after withdrawal? Let it fester and hope that Hamas takes over, and takes the blame for what goes wrong from now on? That won't help much.

From my reading, and attendance at some liberal Jewish and Palestinian discussion panels, the right to return had large symbolic value. I think whoever said that taking a limited number and rest are eligible for some kind of compensation had it right. So coldly junking the whole concept has symbolic value.

And what about the settlements? That is a major shift by the US. And made unilaterally. And what did the US get in return?

And I am a very liberal type, who should be all soft and idiotically squishy and meek and who would not mind much when the US gets rolled. So why do I get so infuriated with Bush gives this stuff away unilaterally and gets nothing? Nothing. At all. And he is supposed to be a tough guy? Even liberal me feels humiliated. Bush acts like a complete fool. Maybe he figures these folks are tough guys so he'll look tough if he agrees to whatever they say. Even if it makes him look like a weak moron. Or maybe it is desperate pandering for the Jewish vote. And this won't be the first effort at that, and polls indicate that the pandering is not working on the intended group. After his "let them fight it out" remark he deserves to lose all the votes of both blocs, and probably will.

As for the comments about Palestinian whining, remember that the Muslim votes in the last election was promising enough for the Bush people to attempt to curry a little favor there. So it is not true that Palestinians are automatically anti-Bush. This proposition seems to be some short term memory lapse cognitive dissonance driven desperation from the Bush backers here.

This is an anecdote, but some Palestinian Christians I know have had their view of younger Bush change from rather favorable to unprintable in the past three years. The last time I tried to discuss the situation I almost got thrown out of the store. I dare say nothing at all now.

"hey, israel will no longer be occupying gaza. that's good. ''

The frogurt is also cursed.

jgl:

That's bad.

But it comes with a free choice of toppings

The toppings contain sodium benzoate

Go to Billmon and read a really long, depressing thread thrashing this issue to death. Really depressing. Why do republicans hate humanity?

Steve writes:
"What does Israel have to offer? It's the only country that remotely resembles a democracy in the Middle East. We have an interest in democracies not being overthrown from without or terrorized by suicide bombers."
Why does everyone forget Turkey? Seriously, why?. And why do we call a state that defines itself by a religion, and thus excludes people based on a religion, a democracy? And then it becomes "real politics" to "preserve" that democracy by keeping out potential voters because they are not what? Members of a certain religion. Does this fit into any reasonable deffinition of democracy?

I just read William Safire's column in the NY Times, to get another view. One of his sureptitious interview/adverisements of Great Men of Our Time.

The Settlement Annex (the "Sharon Salient") in the West Bank is portrayed as a clever part of the new "Sharon Plan"

I think the Sharon salient is rather big and rather too much of change of US policy to just accept unconditionally.

c. wrote, "is there anything, well, anybody does that doesn't result in arab commentators whining?"

Condemning Bush for endorsing war crimes is "whining." Right... (Israel's transporting settlers to the occupied territories is a violation of the Geneva Conventions.)

Suppose you are negotiating with someone over the price of a car. Suppose that one of your bargaining chips is that you are willing to throw in, for free, a mechanic's checkup. Even if both sides know that you will eventually agree to the checkup, can't you see that it would really hurt your position if someone else with power over the deal came along and said 'free checkup--done' when you have received nothing you value in return for it?

This is a metaphor for the problem of unilaterally intervening in negotiations. The Palestinians have very very few bargaining chips available, and we just grabbed one of their chips away for free--who doubts that this will result in more of the extremely misguided 'bargaining chip' of violence against the Israeli people?

"It's the only country that remotely resembles a democracy in the Middle East."

Apartheid is not democracy.

"What specific thing would Bush have to do to get Arab commentators on his side?"

How about saying something like this:

"For nearly forty years, American presidents from both parties have made it clear to the government and people of Israel that we consider them a friend and ally, that we fully understand their security concerns, and that we stand with them in the fight against terrorism. During all this time, America has been the principal supporter of Israel both diplomatically and financially, often standing alone with her in the United Nations, and extending towards her more financial aid than we give to any other nation.

"But all eight American presidents over that period have also, equally consistently, refused to accept the claim that Israel has a right to build settlements in the territories it occupied after the 1967 war, or to claim as its own the territory on which such settlements are built. One president after another has warned Israel that we regard this settlement policy as not only a violation of international law but as an obstacle to peace.

"Many of Israel's critics, and even some of Israel's strongest defenders, were fearful that these settlements were part of a cynical plan to draw up new borders by creating 'facts on the ground' which could never be reversed through negotations. Israeli leaders always have claimed that this wasn't the case, that the settlements were not territorial markers, and that they didn't threaten the road map to peace that Israel agreed on.

"But now Prime Minister Sharon insists that any final negotiation of borders must take into account the new, quote, patterns of population, unquote, which have taken effect over the last thirty-seven years. In other words, he insists that Israel is entitled to acquire new territory based on the settlements it created itself, unilaterally and by force, and in defiance of all the warnings it received from both foe and friend not to do so. In effect, Prime Minister Sharon is now tossing aside all the protestations Israel has been making since 1967, and vindicating all its critics who said all along that it was following a policy of de facto annexation.

"The United States government regards this as flatly unacceptable. During the negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians over a final peace agreement, Israel cannot, in good faith, claim that the final borders must be altered in response to the 'fact' of the settlements, a 'fact' created by the Israelis themselves."

Thanks Mr. Kramer, excellent response.

I was hoping someone would respond to Mr. Montgomery's question about Why we need Israel as a strategic ally?

Why did Bush do it? His advisors determined he could get a two for one on this deal. The Jewish Block and the Religious Right.

My guess is that many people in this discussion are too young to remember how the "West" Bank - that's west of Amman -- came under Israeli control: the Jordanian Army, which tried to invade Israel, lost it in battle. In fear of their own people, the Jordanian government then cut the area loose, declaring it "Palestinian," a word meaning "belonging to refugees we don't want around in *our* backyard." But refugees kicked out of Jordan, not out of Israel.

Trimming bits and pieces of this land for security purposes is a detail in cleaning up after a war that took place two generations ago. If there are Arabs around who wanted Israel to have secure borders some place else, the time for them to have spoken was in 1966.

As it is, the Arabs made war to change the borders, and the borders have duly been changed.

* * *
In the same vein, it's annoying to see people here accusing Israel of apartheit. One doesn't expect to run into such stupidity around this blog. Hell, Israel is the only country in the whole world where Arabs have a free and fair vote, and representation in a democratic parliament. And it is the only counry in the Middle East where ordinary members of an Arab working class have a good shot at work, economic advancement, and a decent college education for their children.

The response to the Bush-Sharon deal is wildly overwrought. I doubt that there is any deal, other than complete capitulation to Palestinian wishes, that would meet with widespread Arab approval.

The underlying assumption of much of the criticism is that a fair solution would be a help in what AA calls the "war for Arab public opinion." It wouldn't. Say what you want about the West Bank settlements. I don't like them either. But let's distinguish between a fair agreement and one that would be popular with Arabs. Those aren't the same thing.

And those who criticze Israel as "apartheid," "theocratic," etc. might want to take a quick look around the Middle East and ask whether there might be better targets for those criticisms. The country IS a democracy, Mr. Johnson. If it doesn't quite live up to your ideal notions - and its closer than you give it credit for - then maybe you should come down from the clouds and take a look at the real world.

YOU DID NOT ONLY LOOSE THE WAR FOR ARAB PUBLIC OPINION, YOU LOST EUROPE AS WELL.

http://ue.eu.int/newsroom/makeFrame.asp?MAX=&BID=109&DID=79932&LANG=1&File=/pressData/en/declarations/79932.pdf&Picture=0

Brussels, 15 April 2004
S0102/04

Comments by
Javier SOLANA,
EU High Representative for the CFSP (Common Foreign and Security Policy)

following the meeting between President Bush
and Prime Minister Sharon

Javier Solana, EU High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP), made the
following comments after the meeting between President Bush and Prime Minister Sharon on
Wednesday:

"I welcome the Israeli Prime Minister's proposals for disengagement from Gaza. This represents an
opportunity to restart the implementation of the Roadmap, as endorsed by the UN Security Council.
The EU remains committed to a negotiated agreement resulting in two viable, sovereign and
independent States, Israel and Palestine, as the only way to achieve a permanent peace and an end
to the occupation that began in 1967, in the framework of a comprehensive peace in the
Middle East. Final status issues can only be resolved by mutual agreement between the parties.
EU Heads of State and government recently indicated that they would not recognize any change to
the pre-1967 borders other than those arrived at by agreement between the parties. A permanent
settlement must also include an agreed, just, fair and realistic solution to the refugee issue.
The EU also underlines the need for Israel to coordinate with the Palestinian Authority practical
arrangements for an orderly hand-over of responsibilities to the Palestinian Authority. The
Palestinian Authority should demonstrate its readiness to assume these responsibilities in particular
in the areas of security and good governance.
The Quartet will now examine in detail the proposals by Prime Minister Sharon. It should lead the
efforts of the international community in support of the implementation of the disengagement plan.
The EU remains ready to play its full part in helping build up the capabilities of the Palestinian
Authority in the economic, security and administrative areas. The EU will continue to be a major
contributor to the reconstruction and long term development of the future Palestinian State."

And, in case someone forgot, Solana once was secretary general of NATO.

Bush has sent an important message to the Palestinians: “Your behavior matters.” When you want something from someone you must act accordingly. The Palestinians want Bush to pressure Sharon for their benefit. Bush in turn wants the Palestinians to behave in a responsible manner and help fight terrorism. But what did they do instead? They started talking about bringing Hamas into their government. What did Sharon do? He announced a unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. Compare and contrast.

Based on his record, Yasser Afarat seems to believe that the proper negotiating strategy is keep turning down offers in the belief that he will get a better one tomorrow. He is of course assuming that he can always get at least what he down. But I think his assumption is wrong, and he has something like “Sultan’s Dowry Problem” also called the “Marriage Problem.” He should not have turned down Barak’s offer at Camp David in summer 2000. I don’t think he will ever get a better one and he shouldn’t. To give him the hope of a better offer is to adopt a policy of appeasement. He is not going to get a “right of return” to Israel for Palestinian Arabs, even at a token level (which he would reject anyway as too little). Lots of people who have been displaced in this world don’t expect a right of return. For example, the Sudeten Germans, who were punished as a people by the Allies and ejected from their historic homeland don’t seem to demand a right of return and they have a much better case for it than the Palestinians.

Finally I should remind the American commentators here that the Palestinian terrorists kill Americans as well as Israelis. Remember the Achille Lauro hijacking where the American tourist Leon Klinghoffer was tossed overboard? Moreover, the Palestinians supported Saddam in Gulf War I and cheered in the streets after 9/11? Perhaps you don’t care, but most Americans do.

Israel is committing suicide. There are 10 million Palestinians, most of which live in abject poverty in sewage-strewn camps in Gaza, the West Bank and neighboring countries.

They will remember the seizure of their nation, and they will remember who paid for it.

They will certainly use weapons of mass destuction against the occupiers, either in Tel Aviv or in the United States.

The Israelis are commiting suicide; the only question is whether the United States will go down with them.

When Israel collapses and the Arabs are over the wall, their missiles won't be luanched at Cairo or Even Damasus. they will be launched at the United States of America and at Europe

Today we see that the Israelis have killed Mr. Rantisi. Soon they will kill Mr. Arafat. Yes, Arafat and Yassin were terrorists. So were Menachem Begun and Nelson Mandela. Sharon's actions are totally incompatible with a desire for peace. They indicate a desire to "bring it on" backed by the hubris which Homer recounted. Bush should not have supported Sharon. American military commanders in Iraq should not emulate the IDF by going out of their way to fight Shi'ites. Pride goeth before a fall and I fear that we, Americans and Israelis, will take a fall of Biblical proportions. Does anyone doubt that Islamic extremists can purchase a nuclear weapon from our friend, Dr. A.Q. Khan? I agree with Bob.

Lloyd-Jones, Zarkov and Yomtov make some valid points. But the subject of this blog is Bush's notion of good way for the US to act in this process, and I still think his notion stinks.

The right of return will be token, some Israeli settlements will stay on the Westbank, the pre-war Israeli borders are not sacrosanct.

Still, Bush's approach has not been helpful, and I don't see how the US has been helped by it. I don't think I am overwrought about that.

Bob: The total population of the West Band and Gaza strip is about 3.4 million, not 10 million. Subtracting the Jewish and Christian populations you get about 3 million Muslim Arabs. No one seized their nation, there was no nation to seize. The current inhabitants of West Bank and Gaza are mainly the descendents of the approximately 600,000 refugees that resulted from the Arab war (Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Trans-Jordan and Iraq) against Israel that started in May 1948. These refugees came mainly from the Jaffa, Ramiam, Haifa, Acre and Beersheba areas. Many of these refugees were enticed to leave by their own political leaders who promised them a speedy return once the new state of Israel had been destroyed. About 160,000 Arabs did not leave Israel, and their descendents are the only Arabs in the Middle East that can vote for anyone. The Arab counties refused to resettle the refugees, preferring to leave them in camps so as to create an on-going problem they could exploit. For example in April 1949 at the UN Palestine Conciliation Commission meeting in Lausanne, Israel offered to repatriate 100,000 Arab refugees. The Arab delegations rejected that offer. So here is an early offer of more than a token “right of return.” Trans-Jordan occupied the West Bank in 1948 and annexed it in 1950. So until 1967 Arabs governed the West Bank yet there was still unremitting terrorism against Israel. And two major wars, one in 1956 and the other in 1967.

France was the chief provider of arms to Israel until after 1967. The Israeli air force used French Mirage jets in the 1967 war. Jordan used American tanks to fight Israel in that war. So if anyone “paid” for Israel gaining control over the West Bank it was France.

Bob what leads you to think that the PLO will be able to wage a successful future war against Israel when the combined forces of Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon were unable to do that in the past when Israel was much weaker? Some magic WMD that they will somehow develop on their own or someone will give them?

Brad, think of it more as a tango than an edict written in stone. Bush, may Allah be pleased with him, is getting hammered in Iraq, by the very people he purports to bring demos, freedom and to.

So he embraces Sharon and the Zionist agenda of unilateralism, the sly fox mincing across the sand with his goad, and his assassin's blade.

It hasn't worked for Israel in 48 years, so why in Allah's name Bush believes he can play Sharon to Iraq's Al-Sadr and win is beyond me.

We have 45 more days to find out, although our kids in uniform are the ones to take the hits!

It is time for the US to recognize one of the major "facts on the ground": we cannot moderate or affect significantly Israeli's policy with respect to the West Bank or the Palestinian people. Bush's rolling over is simply part of the end game that facts on the ground have been orchestrating for some time.

To continue to pretend that we have some role to play as an honest broker only poisons our relationbship with the Arab world, a world of well over a hundred million people and with interests that are important to us. We have subordinated this policy to our Israeli policy for too long and unnecesarily given our desire for the health and survival of Israel.

It is time to step back from Israel and to make clear to the Arab world that we are not responsible for Israeli policy and have little or no control over it. This is not to abandon Israel but to recognize it as a mature state and one that can take care of itself which it has amply been doing from its inception but one whose interests are not always one with the US.

The sincereity of this claim would be manifest by our cutting most or all of the foreign aid to Israel which gets the biggest share of that program at present, a manifest irony given the level of development in Israel. Such large blocks of aid have done more to foster the colonialization of the West Bank than our avowals to the contrary have been able to slow it. Money is fungibile.

This disengagement will prove healthy all around.

There are 7 million Palestinians outside of Israel/Gaza/West Bank. Every time one quotes these numbers, some Likudnik Zionist declares that the Palestinians left of their own will. Well, they're back. And on demographic trends that we see, there will be....20 million Palestinians in a generation. While the Jewish population actually levels/shrinks.

The Arabs will not destroy Israel with "armies". They will simply lob a dirty bomb into Tel Aviv, or nuke an Israeli City. Or, God Forbid, start slaughtering Jews in the United States.

The self-delusion of Zionists is breath-taking. Do you realy think you can torture people in shit-strewn Camps - not unlike the Warsaw Ghetto - for a generation and expect them to just "take it".

They're not going to take it. It will come down to hand-to hand combat. The Hutus killed a half million Tutsis in two months.

Israel is committing suicide

"My guess is that many people in this discussion are too young to remember how the "West" Bank - that's west of Amman -- came under Israeli control: the Jordanian Army, which tried to invade Israel, lost it in battle....

Trimming bits and pieces of this land for security purposes is a detail in cleaning up after a war that took place two generations ago. If there are Arabs around who wanted Israel to have secure borders some place else, the time for them to have spoken was in 1966.

As it is, the Arabs made war to change the borders, and the borders have duly been changed."

There was a Doonesbury strip about 30 years ago, where Duke, as governor of American Samoa, is getting wasted with Jim Andrews, the Universal Petroleum CEO, after they've struck oil on Samoa.

Andrews asks Duke, "Why can't we just level the island to make it easier to drill?" Duke says, "I don't know, why can't we?" Duke's aide MacArthur responds, "There are people living on it, sir."

And this is the problem with such arguments concerning the West Bank: they forget that there are people living on it. And any so-called peace plan that places the security interests of 200,000 Israeli "settlers" ahead of the well-being of 3,000,000 Palestinians is going to break apart on the rocks of that fact.

a thought to provoke you: "Israel is a failed state".

the original goal for the creation of a Jewish state was to create a safe harbor for Jews who were hunted in other nation-states. but since then the capability of individuals to bring widespread destruction has risen significantly. we all have seen 20 men caused 3000 deaths and several billions damage. all it takes is determination of individuals. right now israel is not a safe harbor anymore but a giant trap.

what we have to fear most is a microbiologist working not merely on a weapon (deadly to the oponent, safe to the attacker), but on a final tool of remorseless vengeance.

if the last Mohikan could with one decision kill all the white settlers, would he do it?

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