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Secretary Kerry, on words one does not pay customs

An Arab colloquialism, frequently employed by Arab policy-makers in order to mislead foreign movers and shakers (including American Secretaries of State) suggests that “on words one does not pay customs (?????? ?? ???? ????).”

For instance, on October 16, 2014, Secretary of State John Kerry stated: “I was just in Cairo, where a terrific $5.4bn was raised in order to help rebuild Gaza.”  In fact, $5.4bn was not raised; it was verbally pledged against the backdrop of a litany of unfulfilled Arab pledges to help the PLO, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority.  

While Secretary Kerry assumes that Arab leaders walk-the-talk when it comes to the Palestinian issue, a July, 2014 study by the Congressional Research Service states: “Routinely, [Arabs] make generous pledges of aid to the Palestinians, but at times fulfill them only in part and after significant delay…. According to Reuters, ‘a high of $1.8bn in foreign aid from Arab countries in 2008 plunged to $600mn in 2012, with Gulf countries scaling back their giving….”  The study indicates that since 2008, the US foreign aid to the Palestinians has averaged $400mn annually, more than the oil-rich Saudi Arabia ($260mn in 2013, $100mn in 2012 and $180mn in 2011), the United Arab Emirates ($50mn in 2013) and Kuwait ($50mn in 2013). 

The Qatari Al Jazeera reported that “Palestinian officials are skeptical of Arab aid pledges, as few Arab countries carried through on promises last year…. “

On December 26, 2012, Nabil Elaraby, the Secretary General of the Arab League, divulged that “Arab countries pledged a $100mn monthly safety net to the Palestinian Authority at the March, 2012 Baghdad Arab Summit, but none of it has been realized yet.”

According to the official site of the US Department of State, Secretary Kerry stated at the October 16, 2014 Department of State reception in honor of the Muslim Eid al-Adha holiday: “As I went around and met with people in the course of our discussions about the ISIL coalition, there was not an [Arab] leader I met who did not raise with me, spontaneously, the need to try to get peace between Israel and the Palestinians, because it was a cause of recruitment and of street anger and agitation that they felt they had to respond to.  And, people need to understand the connection of that….”

Professor Efraim Karsh, the founding Head of Middle East and Mediterranean Studies Center at King’s College, University of London, and a senior researcher at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar Ilan University, highlights – in a July 2014 publication, “The Myth of Palestinian Centrality” – the wide gap between the lavish Arab talk and the scant Arab walk when it comes to the Palestinian issue.

While Secretary Kerry assumes that the Palestinian issue is a crown jewel of Arab policy making and the crux of the Arab-Israeli conflict, Prof. Karsh writes: “pan-Arabism does not consider the Palestinians a distinct people deserving statehood, but rather an integral part of a wider Arab framework…. In the words of Hamas leader, Mahmud Zahar, ‘In the past there was no independent Palestinian state….’ The 1948 pan-Arab invasion of Israel was more of a classic imperialist scramble for territory, than a fight for Palestinian national rights. The first Secretary General of the Arab league, Abdel Rahman Azzam, admitted that Transjordan ‘was to swallow up the central hill regions of Palestine; the Egyptians would get the Negev; the Galilee would go to Syria….'”

In fact, the 1948/9 war was not fought by Arab countries because of – or for – the Palestinians.  Therefore, Iraq, Jordan, Egypt and Syria occupied Judea, Samaria, Gaza and parts of the Golan Heights, but did not transfer it to the Palestinians. Moreover, none of the Arab wars against Israel (1948/9, 1956, 1967, 1069/70, 1973) was conducted on behalf of Palestinians.  And, Arabs never flexed any military muscle during Israel’s wars against Palestinian terrorism (1982/3, 1988-91, 2000-2003, February 2008, December 2008, March 2012, October 2012 and July 2014). Arabs have always showered Palestinians with rhetoric, but never with resources.  Why?

Since the 1950s and 1966, when Mahmud Abbas and Arafat fled Egypt and Syria due to subversion and terrorism, Arab leaders have perceived Palestinians as a source of violent unrest. Prof. Karsh notes that the PLO has a treacherous track record, stabbing its Arab hosts in the back, triggering ferocious civil wars and causing the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Jordan (1970), Lebanon (1970-1976, 1983, 2007), Kuwait (1991), Iraq (2003) and currently in Syria. No Arab country came to the rescue of those Palestinians.

Irrespective of the Arab talk, the roots of the anger and agitation on the tectonic Arab Street are 1,400 year old; unrelated to the 66 year old Israel and its policies. 

Regardless of the Arab talk, the cause of recruitment to – and the vision of – ISIS are derivatives of the 7th century birth of Islam; not of the 21st century Palestinian issue.

Notwithstanding the Arab talk, the failure to consolidate an effective coalition against ISIS reflects the fourteen century old violent, unpredictable, fragmented, anti-Western nature of the hate-education-based Arab World; not Israel’s determination to sustain secure boundaries in the most violently treacherous neighborhood in the world, the Middle East.




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Open letter to Prime Minister Bennett ahead of visit to USA

(Hebrew edition in “Israel Hayom,” Israel’s largest circulation daily)

During your first official visit to Washington, DC, you’ll have to choose between two options:

*Blurring your deeply-rooted, assertive Israeli positions on the future of Judea and Samaria (the West Bank), which would be welcome by the Biden Administration, yielding to short-term political convenience and popularity inside the beltway;

or

*Tenaciously advocating your deeply-rooted, principle-driven positions, which would underscore a profound disagreement with the Biden Administration and the “elite” US media, while granting you and Israel long-term strategic respect, as demonstrated by some of your predecessors.

For example, the late Prime Minister Shamir honed the second option, bluntly introduced his assertive Israeli positions on Judea and Samaria, rebuffed heavy US pressure – including a mudslinging campaign by President Bush and Secretary of State Baker – suffered a popularity setback, but produced unprecedented expansion of US-Israel strategic cooperation. When it comes to facing the intensified threats of rogue regimes and Islamic terrorism, the US prefers principle-driven, reliable, patriotic, pressure-defying partners, irrespective of disagreements on the Palestinian issue.

Assuming that you shall not budge on the historical and national security centrality of Judea and Samaria, it behooves you to highlight the following matters during your meetings with President Biden, Secretary of State Blinken, National Security Advisor Sullivan, Secretary of Defense Austin and Congressional leaders (especially the members of the Appropriations Committees):

  1. The 1,400-year-old track record of the stormy, unpredictable, violent and anti-“infidel” Middle East, which has yet to experience intra-Arab peaceful-coexistence, along with the 100-year-old Palestinian track record (including the systematic collaboration with anti-US entities, hate-education and anti-Arab and anti-Jewish terrorism) demonstrates that the proposed Palestinian state would be a Mini-Afghanistan or a Mega-Gaza on the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria.

It would dominate 80% of Israel’s population and infrastructures in the 9-15-mile sliver between Judea and Samaria and the Mediterranean, which is shorter than the distance between RFK Stadium and the Kennedy Center.

Thus, a Palestinian state would pose a clear and present existential threat to Israel; and therefore, Israel’s control of the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria is a prerequisite for its survival.

  1. The proposed Palestinian state would undermine US interests, as concluded from the Palestinian intra-Arab track record, which has transformed the Palestinians into a role-model of intra-Arab subversion, terrorism and ingratitude. Arabs are aware that a Palestinian state would add fuel to the Middle East fire, teaming up with their enemies (e.g., Iran’s Ayatollahs, the Muslim Brotherhood and Turkey’s Erdogan) and providing a strategic foothold to Russia and China. Consequently, Arabs shower Palestinians with favorable talk, but with cold and negative walk.

Hence, during the October, 1994 Israel-Jordan peace treaty ceremony, Jordan’s military leaders asserted to their Israeli colleagues that a Palestinian state west of the Jordan River would doom the pro-US Hashemite regime east of the River, and lead, subsequently, to the toppling of all pro-US Arab Peninsula regimes.

  1. There is no foundation for the contention that Israel’s retreat from the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria – which are the cradle of Jewish history, religion and culture – is required in order to sustain Israel’s Jewish majority. In reality, there is unprecedented Jewish demographic momentum, while Arab demography – throughout the Middle East – has Westernized dramatically. The Jewish majority in the combined area of Judea, Samaria and pre-1967 Israel benefits from a robust tailwind of fertility and migration.
  2. Israel’s control of the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria and the Golan Heights, bolsters its posture of deterrence, which has daunted rogue regimes, reduced regional instability, enhanced the national security of all pro-US Arab regimes, and has advanced Israel’s role as a unique force-multiplier for the US. An Israeli retreat from Judea and Samaria would transform Israel from a strategic asset – to a strategic liability – for the US.
  3. As the US reduces its military presence in the Middle East – which is a global epicenter of oil production, global trade (Asia-Africa), international Islamic terrorism and proliferation of non-conventional military technologies – Israel’s posture of deterrence becomes increasingly critical for the pro-US Arab countries (e.g., Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Oman, Jordan), who consider Israel to be the most reliable “life insurance agent” in the region.

Contrary to NATO, South Korea and Japan, Israel’s defense does not require the presence of US troops on its soil.

  1. Sustaining Israel’s Qualitative Military Edge is a mutual interest for the US and Israel, which serves as the most cost-effective battle-tested laboratory for the US defense industries and armed forces. Thus, Israel’s use of hundreds of US military systems has yielded thousands of lessons (operation, maintenance and repairs), which have been integrated, by the US manufacturers, into the next generation of the military systems, saving the US many years of research and development, increasing US exports and expanding the US employment base – a mega billion dollar bonanza for the US. At the same time, the US armed forces have benefitted from Israel’s military intelligence and battle experience, as well as joint training maneuvers with Israel’s defense forces, which has improved the US formulation of battle tactics.

Prime Minister Bennett, your visit to Washington, is an opportunity to demonstrate your adherence to your deeply-rooted strong Israeli positions, rejecting the ill-advised appeals and temptations to sacrifice Israel’s national security on the altar of convenience and popularity.

Yours truly,

Yoram Ettinger, expert on US-Israel relations and Middle East affairs

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