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Middle East Sandstorms and Tumbleweeds

The US evacuation of Iraq and the 2011 expected evacuation of Afghanistan – and President Obama’s preoccupation with the Palestinian issue – remind me of the Texas colloquialism: “When you’re smothered by a West Texas sandstorm, don’t be preoccupied with the tumbleweeds.”

 

In the beginning of 1990, President Bush believed in the New World Order theory, and pursued engagement with – and not defeat of – Saddam Hussein. He considered the Palestinian issue as the root cause of Middle East turbulence, and therefore pressured Prime Minister Shamir for sweeping concessions. However, Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990 exposed the fallacy of “The New Middle East” and “The New World Order,” sucking the US into a costly, bloody and prolonged quagmire.

 

In 2010, President Obama believes that the USA should act within international consensus, aspiring to bring rogue regimes to the table rather than bringing them to submission. He defines the Palestinian issue as the crux of Middle East violence, and therefore pressures Prime Minister Netanyahu for further groundbreaking concessions.

 

However, in 2010, Middle East sandstorms are growing increasingly lethal and put the Palestinian issue in perspective – a secondary priority for Arab regimes. They highlight fundamental features of inter-Muslim/Arab politics, which clarify that US relations with Israel and with Arab countries are not a “Zero Sum Game.” Middle East sandstorms accentuate special security requirements, which result from the tempestuous nature of the region and underline the critical role played by the US posture of deterrence in bolstering regional and global sanity and stability. Intensifying Middle East uncertainty and volatility also reaffirm Israel’s unique strategic features and highlight the growing potential of the mutually-beneficial US-Israel strategic cooperation.

 

Irrespective of the Palestinian issue, the Arab-Israeli conflict and Israel’s existence, the US is evacuating Iraq and will evacuate Afghanistan, while Iran is going nuclear – a nightmare for Persian Gulf, Middle East and global leaders. Iraq’s evacuation will destabilize the country, advance Iran’s posture and destabilize Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and other Gulf States. Furthermore, the Saudi-Yemen border is boiling; inter-Muslim terrorism proliferates; post-Mubarak Egypt could follow the anti-US Turkish or even Iranian path; the Sudan and the Horn of Africa are saturated with conflicts; the Islamization of Turkey’s policy fosters regional radicalization and Lebanon remains a target for a Syrian takeover and an arena for violent inter-Arab conflicts. Additional intra-Muslim conflicts hemorrhage the region, facilitating Russian, Chinese and North Korean penetration of the region. None of the above is impacted by the Israeli-Palestinian negotiation!

 

These conflicts shed light on 1,300 year old fundamental features of inter-Muslim/Arab reality: Islamic supremacy; autocracy/tyranny; violence as a norm to resolve conflicts and secure power; regime-change through the bullet and not through the ballot; sectarian, religious, ethnic, tribal and ideological violent conflicts; corruption; fragmentation; instability of regimes and alignments; volatility in shifts from peace to war and from conclusion to violation of agreements. For instance, in 1969 and 1979, Libya and Iran were transformed via revolution from pro-US to anti-USA regimes. In 1980 and in 1990, Iraq abrogated peace accords, invading Iran and Kuwait. In 1990, pro-USA King Hussein collaborated with Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait. In 1993, the Oslo Accords were concluded and summarily violated by an unprecedented wave of Palestinian hate-education and terrorism. In 2002, pro-USA Turkey switched over to the anti-USA, pro-Iran, pro-Syria, pro-Hezbollah and pro-Hamas camp. In 2003, a radical regime was trounced in Baghdad, but in 2011 Baghdad could become an active volcano, spreading lava throughout the region.

 

The evacuation of Iraq turns attention to the exceptionally high security threshold required by Israel, resulting from the unpredictable, unstable, violent and volatile nature of the region and its regimes. The more thorough the US evacuation, the higher the level of threat and uncertainty, and therefore the deeper the security significance of the Judea & Samaria mountain ridges – the “Golan Heights” protecting Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and the 9-15 mile sliver of Israel along the Mediterranean.

 

The security, stability and sanity of the Middle East depend upon American determination and deterrence. The evacuation of Iraq, without bringing terrorism to submission – along with hesitant USA policy toward Iran and North Korea – are perceived by rivals and enemies of the USA as lack of endurance, which was demonstrated by the US flight from Vietnam (1973), Beirut (1983) and Somalia (1993). It undermines the USA posture of deterrence and pumps adrenalin into the veins of terrorists.

 

The lower the military profile of the USA and the more volcanic the Middle East, the higher the added-value of the Jewish State as a credible, stable, battle-proven and democratic ally of the USA. Israel is endowed with unique capabilities, which have benefited the US in the areas of intelligence (sharing with the USA more intelligence than all NATO countries combined), defense-industrial Research & Development, manufacturing, refurbishing and exports (promoting US military systems and providing the US with the largest battle-proven laboratory), counter-terrorism (sharing with the US Israel’s unique experience) and operations (foiling coups in Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, destroying Iraq’s nuclear reactor and Syria’s nuclear plant, deterring rogue regimes, upgrading battle tactics, etc.). Such unique Israeli potential becomes doubly pertinent in face of the expected 2011-2012 Middle East sandstorms.

 

US-Israel mutual interests behoove a dramatically enhanced strategic cooperation, focusing on the larger Middle East and global context – and not on the narrower Palestinian context – which is critical to dire economic and security concerns of the US, Israel and the Free World.




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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.

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Videos

The post-1967 turning point of US-Israel cooperation

Israeli benefits to the US taxpayer exceed US foreign aid to Israel

Iran - A Clear And Present Danger To The USA

Exposing the myth of the Arab demographic time bomb