Suddenly the World Sees the Emperor has no Clothes

There is no question that feathers have been ruffled as the USA starts to call a spade, a spade. The fact that the emperor has no clothes and no one dared to say so is now being discussed openly.

 NATO member nations always would promise, indeed swear, that they would meet their military spending commitments, even as they had no intention at all of doing so. Fine, said the Americans, since World War II it has been the duty of the United States to lead and protect the West. American presidents would lecture NATO nations about their promised obligations and meanwhile expect public nods and private snickers. In the New York and Washington corridor, the gospel was never to question the changing role or funding of NATO but always to utter “NATO is the linchpin of the West.” This is no no longer the case.

The Palestinians always have to remain  “refugees” in a way that similar displaced people who were also forced out of their homeland — Prussians, Jews of the Middle East, or Volga Germans — no longer have refugee status, after more than 70 years. The USA has now accepted reality and quit funding the United Nations relief organization that supposedly attends to “refugees” who in reality are a political tool deemed useful for demonizing Israel around the world. The UNWRA self defined status of a refugee is not acknowledged in any other international agency.

Jerusalem has long been privately accepted as both the historic and natural capital of Israel, (whether it be all Jerusalem or only a part), and it’s now far more open and freer than it was prior to 1967. But we were not supposed to say that given fears of Palestinian anger, or terrorist attacks, or inflaming the Middle East. Trump in his supposedly reckless fashion simply moved the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, and other nations strangely are beginning to follow.  

Even the BDS campaigners are now publicly being acknowledged as campaigning for the destruction of Israel rather than the human rights of the Palestinians.

25 years after Oslo, the US. Pressures Palestinians to give up a Lost War

by Ziva Dahl  September 6, 2018

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/25-years-after-oslo-the-us-pressures-palestinians-to-give-up-a-lost-war-566739

September 13, 2018 marks the 25th anniversary of the first of two Oslo Accords, which the late Charles Krauthammer referred to as “one of the great miscalculations in diplomatic history.”

Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat signed the initial 1993 accord on the White House lawn. A second accord followed in 1995. In exchange for Arafat’s signed pledge to renounce terrorism and other violence, remove the Palestine Liberation Organization’s Covenant statement denying Israel’s right to exist, and to work toward a two-state settlement, Israel would withdraw from areas with dense Palestinian population and allow a Palestinian Authority to govern 95% of its population. 

Oslo represented an act of appeasement by the Jewish state. Sick of war and hungry for peace, Israeli leaders deluded themselves into believing that PLO chairman Arafat had accepted Israel’s existence.

Israel fell for a grand deception. The Palestinians never changed their covenant, continued their terrorist activities, established a kleptocracy and, at Camp David in 2000, rejected a magnanimous Israeli two-state peace plan – an act that President Clinton called a “colossal mistake.” Arafat began a war of terror that killed more than 1,100 Israelis (78% civilians) and wounded 8,000. In 2008, Arafat’s successor, Mahmoud Abbas, refused an offer that was even more generous.

More than a decade after Oslo, Israelis gradually concluded that you can’t make peace with an enemy determined to replace you with a 22nd Arab state. They realized that Oslo was part of the PLO’s “phased plan” to establish political control over territory Israel gave them and use that base to continue the “armed struggle” until it had “liberated” all of Israel from the Jews.

Oslo exacted a painful price, effectively allowing the PLO to transform Judea, Samaria and Gaza into terrorist hotbeds.  The PLO achieved international credibility. They created a propaganda machine to defame and delegitimize Israel, added “occupied Palestine” to the world’s lexicon and won the support of the Left. The PLO radicalized the Palestinians and Israel’s Arab minority, openly glorifying brutality and terrorism with religious zeal.

Palestinian culture views Israeli compromises, peace offers and “painful concessions” as signs of weakness and vulnerability. Oslo made a bad situation worse, strengthening the Palestinians’ resolve to vanquish the Jewish state.

President Trump’s predecessors rewarded the Palestinians for bad behavior and inadvertently fueled their will to fight on. Trump has warned the Palestinians that the US will no longer acquiesce to Palestinian intransigence and that violence will cost them dearly. 

Tump’s administration rejects the Palestinian claim to the right of return to Israel of the five million descendants of the original Palestinian refugees, withholding its $400 million funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), with the goal of shuttering that anti-Israel organization that supports Palestinian irredentism (a political or popular movement that seeks to claim/reclaim and occupy a land that the movement's members consider to be a "lost" territory from their nation's past) and terrorism. 

President Trump previously signed the Taylor Force Act, freezing budgetary aid to the PA until it halts its program to pay for terrorism against Israelis, and recently announced a cut of more than $200 million in aid to the Palestinians.

The Saudis are also applying pressure on the Palestinians. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman suggested that the Palestinians accept Trump’s “proposals” or “shut up.”

Trump is playing hardball. So far he hasn’t fallen into the Oslo trap. He’s attempting to demoralize the Palestinians to destroy their will to fight a lost war. This will take much more time and effort, continued pressure by the US and Israel, and new Palestinian leadership.

Newsflash: Jerusalem Not on Fire!

by Bassam Tawil  December 10, 2017

Full article at https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/11523/jerusalem-not-on-fire

The Palestinians declared a three-day-long "rage" spree over US President Donald Trump's announcement recognizing Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Thus far, however, it seems that the real anger is showing up in the international media, not on the Palestinian street.

Question: How many foreign journalists does it take to cover the Palestinian reaction to Trump's announcement? Answer: As many as the Israel-Palestinian-conflict-obsessed-West can manage to send.

The massive presence of the international media in Jerusalem and the West Bank has taken even the Palestinians by surprise. Since Trump's announcement on December 6, dozens of additional journalists and camera crews have converged on Israel to cover "the big story."

Some of these reporters, including those working for American networks, have been flown in from their working posts in London, Paris, Cairo and New York to cover what many of them are already calling the "New Palestinian Intifada." But is it really a new intifada, or is it simply wishful thinking on the part of the swarm of Palestinian and foreign reporters?

In the past few days, we have seen wild exaggeration in the media as to what is really happening in and around the Old City of Jerusalem. What is evident, however, is that the number of journalists and photographers covering the protests in the city has thus far exceeded the number of Palestinian protesters.

Let us start with Friday, December 8, the final day of the announced Palestinian "rage." The Palestinian Authority, Hamas and other Palestinian groups told us to expect mass rallies and protests after Friday prayers at the Al-Aqsa mosque compound. So did the reporters.

By early morning, at least six television production trucks were stationed in the small parking lot outside the Damascus Gate, the main entrance to the Old City of Jerusalem. The trucks belonged to various television stations were presumably brought there to film live broadcasts of the anticipated mass protests. Another 70-80 journalists and photographers were waiting, some impatiently, for the Muslim worshippers to finish their prayers and start their protests against President Trump's announcement.

What we got in the end was a small and peaceful protest of some 40 Palestinians, who chanted slogans against Israel, the US and Arab leaders -- including Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas, who was dubbed a "traitor" and "Israeli spy."

Björn Stritzel, an honest and brave German journalist, tweeted from the scene: "More journalists than protesters after Friday prayers."

The media frenzy was echoed by several other reporters. "Three days of 'rage' have passed since Trump's Jerusalem declaration and Armageddon hasn't arrived," remarked journalist Oren Kessler. "One is loath to make predictions of continued calm in the region, but thus far the doomsday prophecies have not materialized."

French journalist Piotr Smolar, who also waited for the "big" protest, wrote: "Dozens and dozens of journalists at Damascus gate, where nothing has happened until now."

Joe Dyke, a reporter with Agence France Press (AFP), tweeted  a photo showing more journalists than protesters at Damascus Gate. He wrote: "Small Palestinian protest at Damascus Gate in Jerusalem broken up by the Israeli police. They seemed to object to a picture of Trump as a toilet."

Dyke later reported that he had "just walked through Jerusalem's Old City and the situation is very calm. More police on streets but no issues as yet. Tourists milling about."

Here is how the journalist Seth Frantzman of The Jerusalem Post, who was at the scene, described the situation: "There are more people with cameras here than anyone clashing (with police) at the moment."

Frantzman later had this to say about the "clash": "There are as many media and onlookers taking photos here as there are youth and police waiting for the clashes."

Protests against Israel and the US are not uncommon on the streets of Ramallah, Hebron and Bethlehem. But for the "war correspondents," there is nothing more exciting than standing behind burning tires and stone throwers and reporting from the heart of the "clashes." Such scenes make the journalists look as if they are in the middle of a battlefield and are risking their lives to bring the story home to their viewers. They might even receive an award for their "courageous" reporting from danger zones!

That is what happens when you are afraid to go to Yemen, Libya, Syria or Iraq to cover the real bloodshed.

Newsflash for the journalists: There's nothing new on the Palestinian street. Palestinian threats of violence and walking out of any "peace process" is old, old news. Jerusalem is not on fire. Jerusalem is tense, and has long been so, because the Palestinians have not yet managed to come to terms with Israel's right to exist. That is the real story. The Palestinians rage and rage and rage for only one reason: because Israel exists. Put that in a story and publish it.

Bassam Tawil is a Muslim based in the Middle East.

Bahrain Delegation Visits Israel with Message of Peace Amid Trump Turmoil

by: AP and United with Israel Arab Staff – Dec 11th

Amid the tension surrounding Trump’s Jerusalem declaration, a group from Bahrain is visiting Israel, taking a step towards better relations with the Jewish state.  

An interfaith group from Bahrain is visiting Israel amid turmoil over President Donald Trump’s historic declaration recognizing Jerusalem as the capital, angering some in the island nation who support the Palestinians.

The group’s trip comes after two US-based rabbis have said that Bahrain’s King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa thinks that the longtime boycott of Israel by Arab countries should end.

While organizers repeatedly described the trip as nonpolitical, the timing comes as Bahrain increasingly looks like the test case for other Gulf Arab nations in seeing what could happen if they recognize Israel.

A group of 30 people from Bahrain, including Buddhists, Christians, Hindus, Jews and Muslims, flew to Israel for the event. They plan to visit universities and talk to officials there about topics of common interest, said Rabbi Abraham Cooper of the Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center (SWC).

“The goal here is to multiply the interactions and contacts among people doing similar things in the overall region,” the rabbi told The Associated Press on Sunday. “Until now, there was absolutely no chance of having contact.”

King Hamad hosted Cooper and another SWC rabbi in February. In September, King Hamad’s son, Prince Nasser bin Hamad Al Khalifa, went to the center to promote a religious tolerance declaration signed by the king.

Will Arab Boycott on Israel End?

It was at that September event that word spread of King Hamad’s comments about wanting the Arab boycott of Israel to end.

That goes against decades of Arab opposition to Israel, which at its heart remains the demand for the creation of a Palestinian state and Israel’s withdrawal from Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria. Only Egypt and Jordan have made separate peace deals with Israel.

However, in recent years, since the forging of the Iran nuclear deal, Sunni Arab states have found themselves on the same side as Israel.

Bahrain, an island nation off the coast of Saudi Arabia connected by a 25-kilometer (15.5-mile) causeway, has long been known as more liberal than its ultraconservative neighbor. Its bars and nightclubs attract cross-border traffic, as well as sailors based there with the US Navy’s 5th Fleet.

The island also hosts a small Jewish community, whose presence occasionally makes waves. An online video last year from Bahrain during Chanukah caused a minor stir when it showed yarmulke-wearing Jews dancing with Arabs in traditional robes and kaffiyeh headdresses.

Betrayal of the Palestinians?

As news of the Bahraini delegation in Israel spread, many took to social media in anger Monday. Already, many had been sending messages of support to Palestinians over Trump’s Jerusalem decision.

“I reject this normalization of relations with the usurping enemy’s entity,” Ebrahim Sharif, a secularist politician, wrote on Twitter. “I consider this visit by the delegation a betrayal of the Palestinian people.”

Living With the Palestinians? ‘NO?’

By  Moshe Dann  Dec 4th 

Full article at http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Living-with-the-Palestinian-No-517000 

Awaiting a Trump administration “peace plan,” hoping to end the Arab-Israeli conflict, it would be wise to recall foreign minister Abba Eban’s observation that “the Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.” It is important, however, to understand that this persistent failure is not because of poor judgments or unintended mistakes; it is deliberate PLO policy, strategy and ideology.

Rejecting peace with Israel is and has always been fundamental to what Palestinians demand – an independent state – and what Palestinianism means: the struggle against Zionism in any form. Any compromise based on accepting Zionism and the State of Israel is, for Arab Palestinians, a non-starter.

The reason is simple: Palestinian nationalism – according to PLO and Hamas charters – is dedicated to wiping out Israel. Accepting Israel would be denying the PLO/Hamas raison d’etre and admitting that those who sacrificed themselves in terrorist attacks died in vain, that Palestinian “martyrdom” was a fraud. It means the end of the Palestinian revolution and its ideology.

Arab Palestinian leaders recognized this nearly a hundred years ago, when, led by the pro-Nazi Mufti Haj Amin Husseini, they rampaged in murderous attacks against Jews. After the State of Israel was established, many Israeli Arabs accepted the new reality, but many did not and never will. The reason is simple: Arabs view Jewish success as their defeat. Moreover, unlike Arabs who migrated to what was called Palestine, Jewish nationalism, Zionism, is rooted in a historical and biblical attachment to the land. Nor did local Arabs imitate Zionist institution-building during the 1920s, ‘30s and ‘40s. Jews built hospitals and agricultural settlements; Arabs raided them. Jews built schools and parks; Arabs initiated pogroms.

What determines – and will determine – the future of Israel and Arab communities on both sides of the “Green Line” (the armistice lines of 1949) is not “Palestinian self-determination” politically, but the imperative of working together economically. The flourishing of Jewish communities in Area C of Judea and Samaria (“settlements”) is irreversible. Arabs can sabotage and try to slow the settlement movement, but they cannot stop it because it has become a committed national policy.

Despite this, the PLO hopes that the international community, led by the EU and UN, will stop Israel from expanding, and that a Palestinian state in some form will emerge. Most experts agree, however, that a Palestinian state is not viable. And political pressure is no substitute for economic development. Economists have concluded that the Palestinian economy is a “basket case,” unsustainable, dependent on foreign aid and Israeli markets, technology and infrastructure. No “peace proposal” can replace that bottom line.

Ironically, the very countries, institutions, organizations and individuals which provide generous funding and are dedicated to Palestinianism have misled and impaired Palestinians. Like it or not, the Palestinian and Israeli economies are bound together. In 2014, officially 12% of employed Palestinians in the West Bank worked in Israel, mostly in construction; many more work illegally and even more work in West Bank settlements. Currently, about 60,000 Palestinians from the West Bank possess Israeli work permits, though estimates are that about twice that number are actually employed and that number is increasing. Two-thirds of all goods imported into the Palestinian Authority come from Israel; sales to Israel account for 80% of PA exports; the PA is Israel’s biggest export market after the US. The Palestinian GDP is only 7.4% of Israel’s. The Palestinian economy relies entirely on the Israeli, Egyptian, Jordanian currencies – and the US dollar; their banks depend on Israel’s banking system. Without monetary independence, political independence is meaningless. The Palestinians simply can’t survive without Israel – and they know it.

This leaves Arab Palestinians only three realistic options: 1) federation with Jordan, 2) peace with Israel, or 3) moving to another country. They can continue building their communities, economy and infrastructure; defeating Israel and/or establishing a separate state  is not possible.

Palestinian Bullies at it Again

As usual the Palestinian terrorist bullies are threatening the world with diplomatic warfare if the US does not give in to their demands. Anything except sitting down to negotiate in good faith.

The Palestinians have decided to present President Donald Trump’s envoys, Jared Kushner and Jason Greenblatt, with an ultimatum at their upcoming meeting with Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas at the end of the month

The Palestinian ultimatum states that unless progress is made within 45 days on launching talks with the Israelis, the Palestinians will consider themselves no longer committed to the US mediation and will turn to an alternative plan to push for unilateral United Nations recognition of a Palestinian state.

A senior Palestinian source said that according to a senior Palestinian affair reporter writing for Al-Monitor, Abbas is running out of the time he has to govern and cannot waste it on “games.”

Abbas is demanding that Trump publicly declare that the US regards the two-state solution as the only solution and that he insist that Israel “stop creating facts on the ground” through construction in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria.

Trump has said he would accept any solution that would resolve the conflict. “I like the one that both parties like,” he said in February, at a joint press conference with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington.

“If we don’t hear within a month and a half that the American team has stopped talking and started doing, Abbas intends to mobilize anyone and everyone he can for the UN General Assembly session on the establishment of a Palestinian state, regardless of the Israeli and American reactions,” the official told Al-Monitor.

Abbas expressed frustration with the US on Sunday, saying he had met with the American representatives 20 times since Trump took office in January but still had no clear vision of what peace plan they had in mind.

“I don’t understand their conduct toward us, as inside his country the administration is in chaos,” Abbas was quoted as saying.

The Palestinian official who spoke with Al-Monitor said that even though the PA’s belligerent course of action could result in serious damage to its relationship with Washington, these were not empty threats and the ultimatum to the US had been carefully considered.

Palestinians: The Secret West Bank

Bassam Tawil  •  April 26, 2017

(Bassam Tawil is a Palestinian Human Rights activist)

• As Abbas and his advisors prepare for the May 3 meeting with Trump, thousands of Palestinians gathered in Ramallah to call on Arab armies to "liberate Palestine, from the (Jordan) river to the (Mediterranean) sea." The Palestinians also called for replacing Israel with an Islamic Caliphate.
• It is possible that deep inside, Abbas and many of his top aides identify with the goals of Hizb ut Tahrir, namely the elimination of Israel. Abbas also wishes to use these Islamic extremists to depict himself as the "good guy" versus the "bad guys." This is a ploy intended to dupe Westerners into giving him more funds "out of fear that the Islamists may take over."
• Abbas's claim that he seeks a just and comprehensive peace with Israel is refuted by fact after fact on the ground. His sweet-talk about peace and the two-state solution will have far less impact on Palestinians than the voices of Hizb ut Tahrir and its sister groups, which strive to "liberate Palestine, from the river to the sea."

Westerners often refer to Ramallah as a modern and liberal city dominated by Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction. The city boasts fancy restaurants and bars where alcohol is served freely to men and women in Western dress, who sit together to eat and to smoke water pipes (nargilas).

But the scenes on the streets of Ramallah, headquarters of Abbas's Palestinian Authority (PA) last week broadcast a rather different message -- one that calls for the elimination of Israel. The message came on the eve of Abbas's visit to the White House for his first meeting with US President Donald Trump.

According to PA officials, Abbas is scheduled to affirm during the meeting with Trump his commitment to the two-state solution and a "comprehensive and just peace" with Israel.

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Palestinians Must Earn a Two State Solution

by Alan M. Dershowitz  February 17, 2017

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/9958/trump-palestinians-must-earn-a-two-state-solution

(I don't want to get involved in discussion of the rights and/or wrongs of the new President of America; the is not for me to judge, However in the area where I am affected, it does seem to me the Trump has leveled the playing field a bit in terms of the conflict with the Palestinians instead of adopting the approach of the earlier administration of blaming Israel for everything. Negotiating means give and take; not one side giving and the other taking.)

President Trump raised eyebrows when he mentioned the possibility of a one state solution. The context was ambiguous and no one can know for sure what message he was intending to convey. One possibility is that he was telling the Palestinian leadership that if they want a two state solution, they have to do something. They have to come to the negotiating table with the Israelis and make the kinds of painful sacrifices that will be required from both sides for a peaceful resolution to be achieved.

Put most directly, the Palestinians must earn the right to a state. They are not simply entitled to statehood, especially since their leaders missed so many opportunities over the years to secure a state. As Abba Eban once put it: "The Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity."

It began back in the 1930s, when Great Britain established the Peale Commission which was tasked to recommend a solution to the conflict between Arabs and Jews in mandatory Palestine. It recommended a two state solution with a tiny noncontiguous Jewish state alongside a large Arab state. The Jewish leadership reluctantly accepted this sliver of a state; the Palestinian leadership rejected the deal, saying they wanted there to be no Jewish state more than they wanted a state of their own.

In 1947, the United Nations partitioned mandatory Palestine into two areas: one for a Jewish state; the other for an Arab state. The Jews declared statehood on 1948; all the surrounding Arab countries joined the local Arab population in attacking the new state of Israel and killing one percent of its citizens, but Israel survived.

In 1967, Egypt and Syria were planning to attack and destroy Israel, but Israel preempted and won a decisive victory, capturing the West Bank, Gaza Strip and Sinai. Israel offered to return captured areas in exchange for peace, but the Arabs met with Palestinian leaders in Khartoum and issued their three infamous "no's": no peace, no recognition, and no negotiation.

In 2000-2001 and again in 2008, Israel made generous peace offers that would have established a demilitarized Palestinian state, but these offers were not accepted. And for the past several years, the current Israeli government has offered to sit down and negotiate a two state solution with no pre-conditions-- not even advanced recognition of Israel as the nation state of the Jewish people. The Palestinian leadership has refused to negotiate.

President Trump may be telling them that if they want a state they have to show up at the negotiating table and bargain for it. No one is going to hand it to them on a silver platter in the way that former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon handed over the Gaza strip in 2005, only to see it turned into a launching pad for terror rockets and terror tunnels. Israel must get something in return: namely real peace and a permanent end to the conflict.

The Palestinians haven't negotiated in good faith. They haven't accepted generous offers. They haven't made realistic counter proposals. They haven't offered sacrifices to match those offered by the Israelis.

Now President Trump is telling them that they are not going to get a state by going to the United Nations, the European Union or the international criminal court. They aren't going to get a state as a result of the BDS or other anti-Israel movements. They will only get a state if they sit down and negotiate in good faith with the Israelis.

The Obama Administration applied pressures only to the Israeli side, not to the Palestinians. The time has come – indeed it is long past – for the United States to tell the Palestinians in no uncertain terms that they must negotiate with Israel if they want a Palestinian state, and they must agree to end the conflict, permanently and unequivocally. Otherwise, the status quo will continue, and there will be only one state, and that state will be Israel.

The Palestinians are not going to win the lottery without buying a ticket.