Happy Chanukah
DoubleTapper: Happy Chanukah
The Obama administration would like to move Syria into the camp of more moderate Arab states, but there is scant evidence that Syria is willing to give up its support for terrorist organizations. Like Iran, it remains a destabilizing and dangerous force in the region.
Key points in this Outlook:
The 2006 war between Lebanon and Israel took not only outside observers by surprise, but also Israel and the government of Lebanon. A day after an operation in which Hezbollah killed five Israeli soldiers and captured two others, the Israel Defense Forces struck Lebanese targets as far north as Beirut. Over subsequent days, the Israeli Air Force bombed Hezbollah-controlled neighborhoods in Beirut and struck targets in the country's north.
U.S., European, and Arab diplomats scrambled to prevent the spread of hostilities. While Arab governments remained conspicuously silent, unwilling to support Hezbollah publicly, if at all, Iranian authorities egged on the militia. Speaking six days after the war began, Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel, the speaker of Iran's parliament, declared, "To Hassan Nasrallah [Hezbollah's secretary general] we say, well done. This religious scholar roars like a lion, and the blood of Imam [Ruhollah] Khomeini rages in his veins."[1] Iran's supreme leader encouraged Hezbollah to keep fighting. According to Nasrallah, Ali Khamenei sent him a letter two days after the war began, which stated, "You have a hard war ahead, but if you resist, you will triumph."[2]
United Nations (UN) Security Council Resolution 1701 restored calm, but only a tenuous one. While the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) returned to Lebanon, it failed to prevent the resupply of Hezbollah with an arsenal even more advanced than before the 2006 conflict. The Lebanese and Israeli border may be calm today, but the potential for regional conflict has only grown. If a new conflict erupts, it likely will be deadlier and harder to contain to Israel and Lebanon. Hezbollah now possesses missiles capable of striking not only Haifa, but also Tel Aviv.[3]
The Obama administration, meanwhile, has reached out diplomatically to both Syria and Iran in the belief that a less confrontational approach to conflict resolution might lead the two states to reconsider their rejectionist behavior. It has not worked. While Tehran and Damascus may welcome the incentives inherent in U.S. engagement, both states continue to use proxies to pursue radical aims and undercut stability. Iran may be Hezbollah's chief patron, but Syria is the lynchpin that makes Iranian support for foreign fighters possible. While Israel may be the immediate target of the Iran-Syria nexus, the partnership threatens broader U.S. interests.
The video's been disgraced, but the image of Mohammed Dura remains a powerful symbol. An MSNBC slide show titled The Decade in Pictures includes this still. (It's picture 58 of 59):
Most notably, the caption doesn't single out the IDF for killing the boy. This tells me two things:
The image hasn't faded from the world's consciousness.
Media watchdogs and web activists are making an impact on "history's first draft."
Over the years, HonestReporting has confronted a number of false or exaggerated libels weighed against Israel. Some of the worst can be viewed on our interactive Big Lies feature. It's incumbent upon us all to fight back and ensure that the truth be an antidote to the poison of online lies.
Mustafa Barghouti (not to be confused with convicted multiple murderer and possible next Palestinian President Marwan Barghouti), a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, lives on another planet.
In an op-ed written for the NY Times, Barghouti talks about freedom and non-violence like a 1960’s civil rights activist instead of a representative of a people which practically invented terrorism as its political strategy.
Through decades of occupation and dispossession, 90 percent of the Palestinian struggle has been nonviolent, with the vast majority of Palestinians supporting this method of struggle. Today, growing numbers of Palestinians are participating in organized nonviolent resistance.
Apparently on Planet Palestine, Hamas — whose charter calls for the murder of Jews and whose leader called for the ‘liberation’ of “all Palestine” just this Monday – did not win a majority in the last Palestinian election. On Planet Palestine, it’s not the case that in 2007, 70% of Palestinian Muslims viewed suicide bombing as sometimes or often justified (Pew survey, 7/24/07) or that 77% of Palestinians say that “the rights and needs of the Palestinian people cannot be taken care of as long as the state of Israel exists” (Pew survey, 6/27/07). Planet Palestine is different from Earth.
On Earth there’s been violent terrorism against Jews by Palestinian Arabs since the early 20th century — long before the ‘occupation’ of Judea, Samaria, West Jerusalem and Gaza, and even before there was a Jewish state. I would like to know — Barghouti must have explained it to the Times’ fact-checkers — exactly what he defines as the ’struggle’ which has been 90% nonviolent. Where is the ‘vast majority’ he mentions?
In the face of European and American inaction, it is crucial that we continue to revive our culture of collective activism by vigorously and nonviolently resisting Israel’s domination over us.
Translation: because Europe and the US cannot force Israel to make even more suicidal concessions than the near-surrender offered by Ehud Olmert in 2008 and Barak/Clinton in 2000 — concessions, like the ‘right of return’ that would be the end of Israel — then the Palestinians will continue to ‘resist’.
Hanukkah is the festival of lights,
Instead of one day of presents, we have eight crazy nights.
--Adam Sandler, The "Hanukkah" Song
Over the past few days I have had the indescribable delight of listening to "Radio Hanukkah" on Sirius/XM satellite radio. After almost a week of listening to 500,000 different versions of "Dreidel, Dreidel, Dreidel" and "Oh Chanuka, Oh Chanuka as well as nonsensical Hanukkah parodies of Christmas songs like "Feliz Hanukkah" and "The 8 Days of Hannukkah", reality hit me harder than a menorah to the forehead...
The holiday alternately known as Chanuka, Hannukkah, Hannuka or any of 10,000 other English spellings is a very different holiday in the United States than it is in Israel.
While both versions result in the same essential practices (lighting candles, eating fried potatoes, dairy foods and donuts, etc) the attitude toward these practices vary tremendously.
Everyone knows the story of this most important Jewish holiday of the year right? The dreidel-spinning Jewish hippies of ancient Palestine (actually JUDEA) needed to light their freedom-lamp but only had enough oil to last one day...lo and behold there was a miracle and it lasted for not one...but eight craaaaaazy nights! I think that reggae rabbi guy from Letterman - what's his name? Matty something right? - might have had something to do with it. And hey look at this, it happened right around that OTHER festival of lights...CHRISTMAS! What a wonderful coincidence! Let's all have a party and go shopping like our wreath-toting Christian brethren, it's perfect! Don't worry little Jakey, your friend Anthony may get a ton of presents on the 25th, but you'll get a new toy EIGHT NIGHTS IN A ROW! Oy vey? Fuhgetaboutit!
Or at least that's the American version of Chanuka.
First of all, if you read that version of the story and didn't find anything wrong with it, please click here immediately and read about the Maccabean revolt, the advent of guerrilla warfare in the Middle East and a potential screenplay for the most violent warrior movie since Braveheart.
Politically, no Israeli prime minister could survive the fact that Iran became a nuclear-armed state, officially or unofficially, on his watch. The pressure on the Israeli government to do something to counter Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons would be so strong that it could well be tempted to play a desperate gamble, regardless of any security guaranties that the U.S. might offer.
Similarly, no U.S. president (especially one endowed with a Nobel Prize) could escape blame for having let Iran become a nuclear-weapon state by consistently underestimating its ability to conceal its preparations. The intelligence community's credibility would be devastated, and the indecision by successive administrations (Clinton, Bush and now Obama) to quash a program that has been suspected for 15 years and openly known for seven would be seen as a failure of major proportions.
What's more, the message sent to all U.S. and Western allies in the Gulf region would be dire. For all the promises made to these allies, the West has been unable to prevent a rogue state—one intent on destabilizing their societies, the strategic balance in the Middle East and beyond, and the oil market—from acquiring nuclear weapons that will make it much more difficult to compel it to behave prudently.
Last but not least, the nuclear non-proliferation regime, which has been significantly weakened by the North Korean antics and the Iranian finessing, would be close to collapse: If Iran has nukes, the temptation for countries such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Turkey, among others, to equip themselves with such weapons would be almost irresistible. The 2010 review conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty would be rendered a feckless pantomime, with almost as little effect as those aimed, between the two world wars, at preventing armed conflict.
It is now necessary, therefore, to plan for the worst—some form of military constraint upon Iran. It is urgent that the U.S., Great Britain and France, together with Israel if possible (in a discreet and deniable way, of course), gather and try to reach agreement on how to terminate the Iranian nuclear program militarily. Those three permanent members of the U.N. Security Council should not be cowed by the argument—which has already been deployed repeatedly by Iranian advocates and idiots utiles—that such an endeavour would be akin to pitching "the West against the rest." They would actually be exercising an implicit mandate on behalf of all the states that have renounced nuclear weapons and do not accept being threatened and bullied by rogues.
How could this be done? The experience of the 1962 Cuban crisis provides an interesting precedent. Applying pressure on the Iranians by interdicting any imports or exports to and from Iran by sea and by air would send a message that would undoubtedly be perceived as demonstrative by Tehran. Additionally, reinforcing the Western naval presence inside or immediately outside the Gulf would make it clear to the Iranians, without infringing on their territorial waters, that they (and all states dealing with them) are entering a danger zone. In parallel to this slow strangulation, measures should be taken to deter Gulf states (such as Dubai) from engaging in any trade or financial transactions with Iran and to encourage them to freeze Iranian assets in their banks. This should not be too difficult, as the threat of disconnecting any renegade from the Swift system would be sufficiently persuasive in the current circumstances, in which Dubai sorely needs international financial assistance.
It might be necessary to go beyond that and actually resort to force to prevent the Iranians from achieving nuclear military capabilities. Planning for a massive air and missile attack on Iran's nuclear facilities (known and suspected) should be considered seriously, and this planning made public (at least partially) to convince Iran that the West can not only talk the talk, but also walk the walk. Such planning should also, to the extent possible, involve NATO, against the territory of which there is little doubt that the majority of Iranian missiles and nuclear weapons would be targeted (if only because they cannot yet reach the U.S.). The U.S., U.K., French and Israeli intelligence services should better co-ordinate what they know, and contributions from others should also be welcome, as well as any information that could be provided by internal opposition movements in Iran.
The idea here is simple, and has been expressed many times by theoreticians of deterrence: When one plans for war, when one deploys forces and rehearses military options, one actually conveys a message. Deterrence is about dialogue. Whether the Iranian government would listen to it is uncertain. But at least it would have been properly warned.
The Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) decided on Wednesday that Mahmoud Abbas will stay on as president after his term expires next month, a PLO official told Reuters.
Abbas's term expires on Jan. 25. The PLO Central Council, meeting in Ramallah, decided to extend his tenure until an election can be held, Wasel Abu Youssef, a member of the Central Council, said.
Weapons seized in Thailand from an impounded plane traveling from North Korea were likely destined for Iran, said a high-ranking Thai government security official on a team investigating the arms.
"Some experts believe the weapons may be going to Iran, which has bought arms from North Korea in the past," said the official, quoting Thai government military experts who also took part in an investigation of the weapons.
Israel-Palestine: D
This was a complete screw up. The only reason it isn't an F is that there's still time to do better.
An Albanian opposition daily revealed in an article published Dec. 2 the involvement of the Albanian government in facilitating the passage of Ukrainian arms to Hizbullah. It said Albania bought the missiles -- type "C 18" and "C 16" – using money from Iran in favor of Hizbullah and the Islamic Jihad.
The shipment, according to the paper, was then transferred via Off Shore Company to Beirut.
Pan-Arab Asharq al-Awsat daily on Tuesday quoted Albanian and Balkan sources as denying knowledge of an arms shipment from Ukraine to Hizbullah via Albania.
It is no accident that arrest warrants never seem to be issued for the likes of Kim Jong Il or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, since the real targets of universal jurisdiction these days are Western nations. Ultimately, what it targets is the very ideas of sovereign accountability and political independence. These goals largely motivated the 1998 Rome Statute that created the International Criminal Court, itself a step toward constraining states' abilities to police their own affairs, and an institution that the Obama administration yearns to join.
Transferring accountability for decisions from democratic politics to the criminal justice system understandably intimidates policy makers from making perfectly justifiable choices, such as defending against terrorist threats. Moreover, "command responsibility" has been transmogrified from liability for failing to stop known criminal activity, to liability when officials "should have known" their subordinates were committing crimes. This further ups the ante and explains why former foreign ministers like Ms. Livni or Henry Kissinger are at risk.
This deterrent impact is exactly what universal jurisdiction advocates seek—both to affect decisions at the highest national levels, and to discourage mid- and low-level officials from implementing disfavored policies. Some foreign critics hope to prosecute former President George W. Bush for enhanced interrogation techniques and the Guantanamo Bay detention facility. While they likely won't get to the former president, they'll be at least somewhat content prosecuting the attorneys who wrote the underlying legal justifications. Incredibly, the Obama administration has yet to definitively reject the possibility of allowing such prosecutions overseas.
Universal jurisdiction against officials of authoritarian regimes sounds appealing. But in these cases, the real goal should be replacing such regimes with representative governments that undertake sovereign accountability for prior transgressions.
Nonetheless, human-rights activists who view their morality as higher than that of elected governments are satisfied by nothing less than prosecution. That is precisely why contemporary universal jurisdiction is so profoundly antidemocratic.
Miliband made the promise in the aftermath of the arrest warrant issued at the beginning of the week for Israeli opposition leader and former Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni. Foreign Secretary David Miliband later announced that Britain would no longer tolerate legal harassment of Israeli officials in this fashion.
Speaking after meeting Israel's London ambassador Tuesday night, Miliband said the British law permitting judges to issue arrest warrants against foreign dignitaries without any prior knowledge or advice by a prosecutor must be reviewed and reformed.
Miliband said the British government was determined that arrest threats against visitors of Livni's stature would not happen again.
"Israel is a strategic partner and a close friend of the United Kingdom. We are determined to protect and develop these ties," Miliband said. "Israeli leaders - like leaders from other countries - must be able to visit and have a proper dialogue with the British government."
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Earlier Tuesday, Miliband called Livni to express his shock over the arrest warrant and pledged to address the matter immediately.
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Miliband earlier in the day denounced the arrest warrant as insufferable, after Israel warned that the matter could harm bilateral ties.
Miliband made the comments during a meeting with Israel's ambassador to Court of St. James, Ron Prosor. The Israeli envoy asked to discuss the matter with Miliband on Monday, following news that Livni had canceled her trip to Britain after a warrant was issued for her arrest.
Prosor told Miliband that the British government must work immediately to combat the grave phenomenon of arrest warrants being issued against senior Israeli officials.
The United States and Egypt, along with France, are planning a joint move to restart Israeli-Palestinian talks on the basis of the June 4, 1967, borders, territorial exchanges and a complete freeze of construction beyond the Green Line, including East Jerusalem. The freeze would not be announced publicly.
Egypt's foreign minister, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, said in an extensive interview with the Arabic daily Asharq Al-Awsat that "once they realized their earlier approach had failed, the Americans see themselves forced to change direction."
He added that Egypt had recently discussed with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas the new strategies for negotiations raised in talks between Cairo, Washington and Paris. An Egyptian source told Haaretz that Egypt's intelligence minister, Omar Suleiman, is scheduled to visit Israel and then Washington in the coming days.
At a press conference in Beirut last week, Abbas said he expects U.S. envoy to the Middle East, George Mitchell, to arrive in Jerusalem and Ramallah during the first week of January. He said Mitchell will be pushing an initiative to renew negotiations, in coordination with the Arab League and on the basis of a complete freeze of settlement construction for five months - without a public statement to that effect.
Such an initiative would allow Abbas to hold general elections in the territories in June 2010. The Egyptian foreign minister said the new program would set up the basic principles of the negotiations, the intended results and a clear timetable. He added that an agreement would have to include the following points: Establishing a Palestinian state on all territories occupied in 1967, with a possibility for small-scale territorial exchanges; establishing East Jerusalem as a Palestinian capital; a just arrangement for all refugee issues; agreed security arrangements; normalization between the Arab world and Israel; and no construction in settlements until the negotiations are complete.