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Inter-Arab Politics: A Culture of Violence

Israel’s security policies must take into account 1,400 years of Arab violence.

 

Galal Nasser, a prominent columnist in Egypt’s al-Ahram Weekly recently wrote: “Violence has become the norm in Arab life, both on official and non-official levels…There are many types of violence besetting the domestic scenes of Arab countries, making relations among them unpredictable and unstable.”

 

Nasser also notes that “Some analysts speculate about a culture of violence and argue that its roots are embedded in religious texts that call for Jihad, that urge the faithful to wage a perpetual fight for virtue and against sinfulness…” he adds that “Neighborliness doesn’t seem to count for much either. There are many instances of strained relations among Arab countries. Currently, tensions exist between Morocco and Algeria, Libya and Tunisia, Jordan and Palestine, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, Syria and Iraq.”

Hence, an Israeli withdrawal from the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria (the most effective tank obstacle in the region, overtowering Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and the 9-15 mile sliver along the Mediterranean) would ignore the intense, volatile and unpredictable 1,400 year old inter-Arab violence and its implications for the security requirements of the “infidel” Jewish State.

 

“The state is involved in the production, export and triggering of violence…nourishing some and instigating others, making deals and manipulating players just to keep its ruling elite in place… Ruling elites are fighting tooth and nail to stay in office. Any challenge to their authority is viewed as an act of war. Meanwhile, the opposition can find itself in dire straits: either it faces a slow and painful death or opts for suicide in a hopeless war…”

 

Meanwhile, Dr. Marwan Kabalan last month wrote in the Persian Gulf News:

“Six decades ago, immediately after the departure of the colonial powers, the Arab world had big and ambitious dreams: unity, development, equality, prosperity and a reasonable degree of economic independence. Sixty years on, one is tempted to ask if the Arab world has really realized any of these objectives and whether they were realistic and achievable in the first place…

 

“Arab rulers have clung to power with complete disregard for public interest…The result was total failure in every aspect of state activities…and to a consequent increase in the use of force to maintain order and control…One consequence of these policies was the weakening of national identity and the revival of communal tension. Hence, people in Iraq and Lebanon and many other Arab countries came to identify themselves as Sunnis, Shiites, Kurds and Christians; rather than Iraqis, Lebanese or whatever else.”

“No wonder that the Arab world looks today much more fragmented, poorer and hopeless than it was at the dawn of independence… For most of these ills, Arab regimes have only themselves to blame. They have indeed left us with very little to celebrate.”

 

In conclusion, due-diligence of the 1,400 year track record of inter-Arab violence behooves the Jewish State to maintain a Middle East-driven (and not wishful-thinking-driven) threshold of security.

 

Israel’s defensible borders and Israel’s agreements concluded with Arab leaders must withstand the implications of potential highly probable and violent abrogation and inter-Arab regime-change. Israel’s security requirements must be the derivative of the 1,400 year old inter-Arab reality: No inter-Arab comprehensive peace, no inter-Arab compliance with most inter-Arab agreements, no inter-Arab ratification of all inter-Arab borders and no Arab democracy!

 

Hence, the security indispensability of the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria – the Cradle of Jewish history – for the survival of the Jewish State.




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US-sponsored anti-Israel UN Security Council statement – acumen

*The US’ co-sponsorship of an anti-Israel UN Security Council Statement reflects the return of the State Department’s worldview to the center stage of US foreign policy-making. This was the first time, in six years, that the US enabled the UN Security Council to act against Israel.

*This is not merely a worldview, which is highly critical of Israel, as has been the case since 1948, when Foggy Bottom led the charge against the re-establishment of the Jewish State.

This worldview has systematically undermined US interests, by subordinating the unilateral, independent US national security policy (on Iran’s Ayatollahs, the Muslim Brotherhood, the Palestinian issue, etc.) to a multilateral common denominator with the anti-US and anti-Israel UN and international organizations, as well as the vacillating and terrorists-appeasing Europe.

*It has sacrificed Middle East reality on the altar of wishful-thinking, assuming that the establishment of a Palestinian state would fulfill Palestinian aspirations, advance the cause of peace, reduce terrorism and regional instability; thus, enhancing US interests.

*However, the reality of the Middle East and Jordan and the rogue Palestinian track record lend credence to the assumption that a Palestinian state west of the Jordan River would doom the pro-US Hashemite regime east of the River, yielding traumatic ripple effects, regionally and globally:

^Replace the relatively-moderate Hashemite regime with either a rogue Palestinian regime, a Muslim Brotherhood regime, or other rogue regimes;
^Transform Jordan into a chaotic state, similar to Libya, Syria, Iraq and Yemen, which would be leveraged by Iran’s Ayatollahs to intensify their encirclement of the pro-US Saudi regime;
^Convert Jordan into a major arena of regional and global Islamic terrorism;
^Trigger a domino scenario into the Arabian Peninsula, which could topple all pro-US, oil-producing Arab regimes;
^Imperil the supply of Persian Gulf oil, which would be held hostage by anti-US entities, catapulting the price at the pump;
^Jeopardize major naval routes of global trade between Asia and Europe through the Indian Ocean, the Red Sea and the Suez Canal;
^Intensify epicenters of regional and global terrorism and drug trafficking;
^Generate a robust tailwind to US’ adversaries (Russia and China) and enemies (Iran’s Ayatollahs, the Muslim Brotherhood and ISIS) and a powerful headwind to US economic and national security interests.

*The State Department assumes that Palestinian terrorism – just like Islamic terrorism – is driven by despair, ignoring the fact that Palestinian terrorism has been driven (for the last 100 years) by the vision to erase the “infidel” Jewish entity from “the abode of Islam,” as stated by the charters of Fatah (1959) and the PLO (1964), 8 and 3 years before the Jewish State reunited Jerusalem and reasserted itself in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank).

*Aspiring for a Palestinian state, and viewing Israel’s control of Judea and Samaria as an obstacle to peace, ignores the Arab view of the Palestinians as a role model of intra-Arab subversion, terrorism, corruption and treachery. Moreover, the State Department has held the view that the Palestinian issue is the crux of the Arab-Israeli conflict and a central to Arab interests, which has been refuted by the Abraham Accords. The latter ignored the State Department, sidestepped the Palestinian issue and therefore came to fruition.

*The State Department overlooks the centrality of the Palestinian Authority’s hate education, which has become the most effective production-line of terrorists, and the most authentic reflection of the Palestinian Authority’s worldview and vision.

*The State Department has also taken lightly the Palestinian Authority’s mosque incitement, public glorification of terrorists and monthly allowances to families of terrorists, which have documented its rogue and terroristic nature (walk), notwithstanding its peaceful diplomatic rhetoric (talk).

*The State Department’s eagerness to welcome the Palestinian issue in a “red carpet” manner – contrary to the “shabby doormat” extended to Palestinians by Arabs – and its determination to promote the establishment of a Palestinian state, along with its embrace of Iran’s Ayatollahs and the Muslim Brotherhood, have been interpreted by rogue regimes and organizations as weakness.

Experience suggests that weakness invites the wolves, including wolves which aim to bring “The Great Satan” to submission throughout the world as well as the US mainland.

Support Appreciated

 




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